Unfair Competition in Providing

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    During the rapid development of networks in zero years, many novice Internet providers competed by hook or by crook. The methods were different: from the “chernukha” on leaflets pasted on the entrances to torn-off cable and the stolen iron of a competitor. Over the years, the market has stabilized and, as usual in this struggle, some names have remained afloat, while others have sunk into oblivion. Some providers were more fortunate and they were bought by major players. Others simply could not stand the onslaught of competitors and disappeared from the market. Now everything was a little different ...

    The change in market conditions somewhat changed the position of forces, but the methods of unfair competition remained the same. Only the opposing sides strikingly differ from each other in the scale of their capabilities. Now, often large federal telecom operators, acting from a position of strength, try to take subscribers from small companies or keep them out of their territory.

    There are many similar stories on our forum.from telecom operators from all over Russia. As a rule, the scheme of work on weaning subscribers is as follows: first, subscribers of a competing provider are called and informed that their provider has gone bankrupt or is being driven out by the management company. Further in the course of ordinary vandalism. The competitor's cable is periodically cut from causing subscribers to suffer. In parallel with this, representatives of the “aggressor provider” ring up or bypass the subscribers by apartment, offering their services. In this case, the subscriber has no choice but to change the Internet provider.

    Here are just a few quotes from our forum from representatives of alternative telecom operators:

    “Good day to all! Situation: Rostelecom calls around subscribers of other Internet providers and offers its services. Calls come to mobile numbers, and the address of the subscriber’s residence to Rostelecom representatives is well known: they offer Internet via dedicated lines to specific addresses. Callers not only advertise their services, but also indulge in criticizing the services of other providers. Moreover, they offer people tariffs that are not available on the official regional site of Rostelecom. We are going together with other local providers to complain about this in the FAS. Has anyone encountered a similar situation? What measures did you take? Any of your thoughts will be interesting and useful. Thank".

    “They sometimes come with a contract in which the passport data and the subscriber’s address are entered, there is a seal and signature of the RT and cut off the cable of another provider, switch it to their equipment - they call the apartment and offer to sign the contract immediately. They reset the settings of the router and voila - the subscriber is already in RT. About the old provider, the speech is short - he went bankrupt and was a fraud, it’s good that you were right at home - otherwise you would have to stand in the office to sign a contract. The leadership of the Republic of Tajikistan has one answer - it’s not us - the contractors are like that and we don’t sign the contract with them - all the questions to the high authorities ”.

    “In our city, one major provider trades in the following way: first, calls are received by subscribers, they are presented by anyone, even to the receiving governor, and they tell tales to subscribers, or even to flee the founders of the connected operator abroad with assets. If the call didn’t give an effect, an apartment round of subscribers began, with the same bikes. After that, everything ended in a prosaic way - they simply cut the cable of competitors, and then they called the subscribers again and were interested in the quality of communication. ”

    These are just a few examples from more than a dozen similar stories. As long as the law enforcement agencies are dealing with all this, the subscriber changes the provider.

    In one of the publications we have already written about how a company building networks in the Far East with the help of a quadcopter periodically catches employees of large telecom operators during the damage of their property.

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    In Khabarovsk, vandals are caught using a quadrocopter.

    All of the above was only a preface to the point. A representative of a small provider “CityLine” from Tambov, just starting out as an Internet service provider, turned to us in the winter. However, a small company has already had to deal with the realities of the market, when large players, who consider themselves owners, simply do not take into account the interests and rights of competitors.

    Tambov is a city with a population of just under three hundred thousand people. Internet providers here are less than a dozen, and the ball is run by local provider Lanta and federal Rostelecom and Green Dot. The latter, just one of the main characters of our story. It is important to know here that Green Dot is a major federal Internet provider, operating in 16 large federal centers of Russia.

    In January 2017, a letter from a certain company, Sistema Svyazi, LLC, came to the Cityline office, asking the provider to remove the fiber-optic cable from their supports. “Communication Systems” is an Internet provider. operating under the brand “Green Dot”. The supports discussed in the letter are located not far from the newly built high-rise buildings in the Sloboda neighborhood in Tambov.

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    On this proposal, “CityLine” asked “Green Point” to send them documents that would confirm the fact of ownership and the legality of the installed supports. The federal operators sent the draft of the pylons, but the document did not have any confirmation of their legality from the city administration, and therefore the ownership was not confirmed. According to the representative of “CityLine”, the document provided by “Green Dot” has no legal force at all. The poet in “CityLine” ignored the requirements of the “Green Point”. As a result, the federal operator set in motion completely different methods of struggle.

    First of all, Green Dot distributed an announcement on the houses warning subscribers about the imminent dismantling of the “illegal” CitiLine cable.

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    Then the same cable was destroyed that hung on supports and optics in residential buildings. After that, “Green Point” with the cable “CityLine” began to connect to the network subscribers who expressed a desire to go to them. In addition, in the aforementioned houses there was no provision for a cable exit from the attic to the communications mine and CityLine had drilled the necessary openings with its own forces and threw the cable. “Green Dot” simply captured the pipe racks and cable, connecting subscribers to it.

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    “They simply do not consider us as competitors and act from a position of strength”
    - Considers one of the founders of “CityLine”.

    In Cityline, they made an inspection report of the pipe posts with a cable, which was attended by a representative of a housing organization serving the houses that became the subject of a dispute, thereby confirming their legitimacy.

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    In this story, it is noteworthy that CityLine offered all sorts of methods for resolving the conflict, and even a system of mutual settlement, when Green Dot would use pipe racks, and Cityline could instead place its cable on supports. However, “Green Dot” disregarded these proposals and continued to bend its line. Representatives of CityLine have already appealed to all instances except the court, but everywhere they were denied assistance. The recent meeting of representatives of CityLine and Green Dot, initiated by the administration of Tambov, did not affect the state of affairs.

    As the head of the law firm “OrderCom”, Dmitry Galushko, told us, in this story, representatives of a large operator act in violation of the law, and the “younger brother”, in turn, needs to turn to law enforcement agencies. Moreover, the actions to destroy the cable generally fall under the violation of criminal law.

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