ISLAMABAD: The Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP) has initiated the recovery of a Rs772 million penalty imposed on Long Distance International (LDI) operators involved in the International Clearing House (ICH) cartel, despite some companies having approached the Supreme Court.
The penalties were imposed after the CCP found that 14 LDI operators had colluded under the ICH arrangement in 2012, eliminating competition in the international telephony market by routing all incoming international calls through a single gateway managed by Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL). This setup led to fixed high termination rates and reduced market efficiency.
The Competition Appellate Tribunal (CAT) upheld the CCP’s findings of cartelisation and abuse of dominance, revising the penalty to two percent of the revenues earned through the ICH arrangement. Following the Tribunal’s decision, the CCP began recovery proceedings.
So far, Rs19 million has been recovered from Multinet (Pvt.) Limited and Rs1.4 million from Voice Communications. Although some operators have challenged the CAT verdict in the Supreme Court, there is no restraining order, and the CCP continues to pursue recoveries under the law.
The penalised companies include PTCL, Multinet Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., 4B Gentel International (Pvt.) Ltd., Wi-Tribe Pakistan Ltd., Dancom Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd., Wise Communication System (Pvt.) Ltd., Worldcall Telecom Ltd., ADG (Pvt.) Ltd., LinkdotNet Telecom Ltd., Telecard Ltd., Circle Net Communications (Pvt.) Ltd., Wateen Telecom Ltd., Redtone Telecommunications (Pvt.) Ltd., and Telenor LDI Communications (Pvt.) Ltd.
