1. Trends in telecom dispute resolution and BDT regulatory tools
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. It is a great pleasure for me to provide you with an overview of trends in telecoms dispute resolution and highlight some of the BDT products and services that may help you in the difficult challenges you face as regulators and policy makers.
Policymakers and regulators recognize that effective dispute resolution is an increasingly important objective of telecommunications policy and regulation. Failure to resolve disputes quickly and effectively can otherwise delay the introduction of new services and infrastructure; block or reduce the flow of capital from investors; limit competition, leading to higher pricing and lower service quality; and retard liberalization — and with it, general economic, social and technical development.
I would like to share with you some of the products and services my colleagues in the Regulatory Reform Unit (RRU) provide to help regulators, policy makers and our sector members.
Regulatory Reform Unit
Telecommunication Development Bureau (BDT)

2. Regulatory Reform Unit
2nd Meeting of the TDAG Working Group
dealing with Private Sector Issues, January 2004
International and regional regulatory forums
Regulatory Database, Online regulatory library (TREG)
Online exchange of best practices for regulators and policy makers (G-REX)
Publications and cases studies on key regulatory issues
Regulatory Models and Best Practices
Training materials and workshops
RRU promotes platforms for exchange of experience between regulators and all stakeholders.
- We do this through meetings such as this one and through the annual Global Symposium for Regulators.
Through our web site TREG, where one can find a wealth of regulatory information on all ITU member states
Through the Global Regulators’ Exchange (G-REX), a password protected on-line forum for regulators and policy makers featuring the Regulators’ hotline.
Our publications, best practice model guidelines, case studies and reports such as our annual publication Trends in Telecommunication Reform.
Each year we conduct an annual regulatory survey to assess and identify sector regulatory trends. The 2005 survey was sent out on 17 May and we would urge all of you to submit your response as soon as possible. The data gathered is analysed and used in all our products and services.
We develop self-learning material. The first ones, on interconnection regulation and gender issues in policy and regulation are designed to provide the basics on these topics. These are available on our TREG website.
In addition, we have just finished an instructor-led online training course on dispute resolution for the Arab region.
Promoting universal access
to ICTs: Practical tools for regulators

3. Source: ITU World Telecommunication Regulatory Database.
Trends: National Regulatory Authorities Worldwide and Percentage per Region
Sector reforms in the communications sector are taking place all over the world. One of the main steps in the reform process is the creation of a separate regulatory authority to monitor the sector.
According to the responses to the annual ITU regulatory survey, today there are 137 countries in the world that have established a national regulatory authority up from 14 a decade earlier. The rise in the number of regulatory bodies in the Arab States has been impressive over the last seven years. Currently 57% of the countries (or 12 out of 21) in the region have established a Regulatory Authority, up from 19% in 1998 and 1 (Jordan) in 1995.
To ensure positive effects of sector reform, effective regulation and rulings are essential. While the role of the regulator, whether separate or within the sector Ministry, is crucial, it is gaining even more importance with the convergence of networks and services and increased competition in ICTs.
Not only do they have a essential role to play as enablers and facilitators, they also have a increasing role to play to resolve disputes.
Source: ITU World Telecommunication Regulatory Database.

4. Level of competition in selected services, world
Where are we now?
Level of competition in selected services, world
2004
The major trend of the past 10 years has been the introduction of competition in the provision of ICT services that were previously provided by monopoly incumbent operators.
Areas such as mobile cellular, value-added and Internet services have been open to competition for some years. Countries were more reluctant, however, to open basic services to competition. This is now changing will be remembered as the year when some form of competition in the provision of basic services became the norm in over 50% of the countries worldwide!
In the Arab States, however, fewer than 20% of the countries have introduced competition in the provision of basic services. This is contrasted with the mobile cellular market where 69% of the countries in the region have introduced competition.
As markets become more and more competitive, the number of disputes are rising, not only between operators themselves but also between operators and the regulator and between operators and consumers.
Regulators face the challenge of defining the areas and the kinds of disputes in which they should intervene and the ones that should be left to operators (self-regulation), competition authorities, the courts or other settlement bodies.
Basic services include: average local, long distance and international services
ITU World Telecommunication Regulatory Database

5. Dispute Resolution Questions
What type of dispute resolution mechanism for which type of dispute? What time frame to handle a dispute? What sanctions? What penalties? How to monitor enforcement? Who hears appeals of regulators’ decisions? What happens to a decision in case of apppeal?
97% of countries worldwide have set up a dispute resoution mechanism.
That being said, stakeholders, regulators and other bodies responsible for dispute resolution are struggling to find the best answers to the questions listed on the slide:
There is no single solution nor one best practice, each country has its own regulatory framework and each type of dispute may be handled differently. Answers to the questions noted on this slide are of strategic importance for the ICT market, from an economic, consumer and social point of view. Both regulators and responsible bodies may find themselves under increasing pressure from market players to apply one mechanism rather than another.
There is a wealth of resources, decisions and experiences available when deciding on which mechanisms and procedures to apply to dispute resolution. These range from conventional official processes, such as regulatory adjudication to some of the innovative, non-official private mechansisms, such as Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) that you will learn more about in this workshop. Whichever mechanism is used, the common goal remains, to provide a vibrant ICT market to promote the needs of end users and consumers. I will explain in a few moments what BDT does to assist you in this challenging task! First let’s have a look at world trends in dispute resolution and enforcement !

6. What Dispute Resolution Mechanisms are used?
Results of the 2003 and 2004 ITU Regulatory Surveys indicated that when negotiations have failed between parties, disputes are resolved in most cases by applying binding rules /decisions (regulatory adjudication).
Mediation/conciliation and arbitration were pursued as second and third options respectively, while recourse to expert determination is used to a lesser extent. And this global trend is likely to continue in 2005 and is followed in the Arab States region!
More than one mechanism can be used by a regulator; this depends on the legislation, the type of disputes and the parties involved. The primary areas of regulatory intervention for disputes are related to interconnection (including unbundling), abuse of dominant position/unfair competition, frequency allocation/usage and interference, pricing, operators (licensee) obligations, service quality, and consumer complaints on issues such as billing. Of course, more than one entity can be involved for resolving specific issues.
For example, unfair competition is often dealt by the regulator and the competition authority.
ITU World Telecommunication Regulatory Database,

7. Mechanisms to resolve interconnection disputes, sanctions power
Effective and efficient dispute resolution requires capacity building on the part of regulators. The regulator needs to have the power to regulate disputes and to have procedures established to adjudicate them as well as to monitor compliance and enforce sanctions in a fair and transparent fashion. Policymakers, regulators and courts, therefore, are adopting a range of alternative approaches to dispute resolution. These include traditional litigation, regulatory adjudication, mediation and conciliation, arbitration and expert determinations. The top slide shows that countries are using multiple forms of dispute resolution mechanisms to handle regulatory disputes, such as interconnection. The bottom slide shows some of the sanctions and penalties regulators can use in enforcement against licensees.
In addition, some countries have established mechanisms that seek to build consensus among market players rather than wait until issues boil to a head in the form of protracted litigation. For example, some countries like Canada and Malaysia have established interconnection committees or industry forums to agree on a range of interconnection issues (prices, points of interconnection, access rights and technical issues) in the spirit of industry self-regulation

8. Deadline for resolving disputes: 30 days – 60 days - 3 months - one year – variable- not defined Sanctions And Enforcement, How to Monitor? Appeals
Efficient and timely dispute resolution procedures are key to a competitive environment.
Some national telecom legislation specify the time frame, that can go from 30 days to 3 months to even a year, others leave it up to the responsible bodies to define.
Once decisions are made, enforcement of these decisions is key to the credibility of the regulatory authority and effectiveness of the national legal framework.
Publishing decisions and sanctions is one way of reinforcing credibility and transparency. 90% of countries make their decisions publicly available. (in most cases (more than 70%) on the website of the regulator).
Regulatory certainty is also implicated by whether a decision remains in force during an appeal, or if it is stayed.

9. Overturning decision of national regulatory authority
While appeal to the court and regulatory decisions may be the prefered procedure, ADR can in certain case provide more expeditious and cost effective avenues to resolving disputes.
Excessive division of regulatory responsibility among different government agencies can result in delayed and inconsistent responses to market and regulatory developments. Court adjudication, for example, may present a number of disadvantages: high costs and delays in some jurisdictions and a perceived lack of telecom-specific expertise to deal with many complex industry disputes. Efficiency is key to dispute resolution. Otherwise lengthy dispute resolution processes will encourage gaming behaviour.

10. BDT Dispute Resolution Products and Services
ITU/BDT-World Bank Study on Dispute Resolution in the Telecom Sector: Current Practices and Future Directions
Focus: Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR)
mechanisms
How to develop a meaningful national dispute resolution process
Models for alternative dispute resolution for different types of disputes
Techniques that can be used in the dispute resolution process
ITU and the World Bank jointly commissioned a study to address the challenges of disputes between operators, consumers and other market players, and to identify current practices and future directions giving special attention to ADR, including negociation, mediation and arbitration.
The study looks at:
- How to develop a meaningful national dispute resolution process
- Models for alternative dispute resolution for different types of disputes
- Techniques that can be used in the dispute resolution process
A paper copy of this study is available here for you to take back to your offices. An electronic version of it is posted on TREG’s home page. (TREG’s URL is mentioned on the last slide!)
I won’t say more about this study as we are fortunate to have with us Mr. Macmillan one of the authors of this study, who will give your more detailled information on this report.

11. BDT Dispute Resolution Products and Services (cont’d)
BDT Study Group 1 Question 18/1 on Domestic enforcement laws, rules and regulations relating to telecommunications
Interconnection dispute resolution mini-case studies
Mentored online e-learning dispute resolution training courses
The multi-lingual searchable online database of regulatory decisions (Joint ITU - World Bank initiative)
- first phase: feasibility study carried out by Lexum
- Second phase: creation of a database
ITU-D Study Group1 question 18|1 is preparing a report and elaborating best practices for regulatory authorities with respect to effective domestic enforcement of laws, rules and regulations relating to telecommunications. The Study Group will meet in September 2005 to approve the report and endorse the best practices.
RRU commissioned a series of 5 mini-case studies in 2003 on interconnection dispute resolution. These examined what five countries have done in this field and include extensive annexes, with many useful data, dispute resolution procedures, and other references:
- Botswana’s use of European benchmarking to resolve an interconnection dispute
- Jordan’s arbitration procedure to solve interconnection disputes
- Denmark’s consensus-building and private dispute resolution procedures
- India’s interconnection disputes in a competitive environment
- And Malaysia’s creation of a consensus-led body the Malaysian Access Forum intended to develop the codes and guidelines for access issues.
A 10 week e-learning course on dispute resolution was prepared based on the ITU/World Bank study and delivered in the Arab States, I will come back to this course in my next slide.
In continuing their collaboration, BDT and the World Bank have conducted a feasibility study on the creation of a searchable online database of regulatory decisions that was presented to the GSR in December ITU and the World Bank now plan to initiate the second phase to commission the creation of such a database. We will be applying for a grant from World Bank to enable us to develop such a database. This project will be a joint effort of the countries making their decisions available in the database, ITU and the World Bank.

12. The 10 week course (21 March-27 May 2005)
E-learning course on dispute resolution in telecommunications for the Arab States
The 10 week course (21 March-27 May 2005)
The objective of the course: to cover the various facets of the evolving telecom scenario and its impact on dispute settlement mechanisms; as well as to provide and overview of different dispute settlement methods and their relative advantages and disadvantages
For those of you who haven’t participated in the successful e-learning course on dispute resolution for the Arab States, let me tell you more about it.
The 10 week e-learning course began in March 2005 and finished last week. This course was intended for decision makers in the field of policy and regulation of telecommunication. The course was limited to a maximum of 30 participants and a greater number of applications were received!
The success of this course was not only due to the active participation of participants but also to the expert and very capable tutorship of Mr. Mr. R.U.S Prasad, retired member of the Telecom Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal of India.
The course was composed of 6 modules. And further information on the content can be found on TREG homepage.

13. Promoting universal access
Trends
2004/05
Licensing in an era of
Convergence
2002
Effective
Regulation
2000/2001
Interconnection
Regulation
2003
Promoting universal access
I would like to mention briefly the other products and services the RRU offers. We publish the annual ITU Trends in Telecom Reform series.
The 2004/2005 edition focuses on licensing in an era of convergence. This theme was also be the subject of a series of case studies that complements Trends report and provide a set of “best practice” guidelines to assist regulators in this matter. These case studies are available on TREG website.
Trends was be presented at the 5th Global Symposium for Regulators, early December 2004.
1998
General Trends
1999
Convergence
and
Regulation

14. Licensing in the Era of Convergence
Global Symposium for Regulators 2005 Hammamet, Tunisia November 2005
Licensing in the Era of Convergence
Day One: Private Sector Sessions
Day Two and Three: Regulator Sessions
The Global Symposium for Regulators (GSR) brings together heads of national regulatory authorities from both developed and developing countries and has earned a reputation as the global venue for regulators to share their views and experiences as part of the worldwide community of regulators. The meeting fosters an open dialogue between regulators and key ICT stakeholders: the private sector, investors and consumers.
This year GSR will take place immediately prior to the WSIS on November 2005 in Tunisia, so don’t forget to mark your calendar!
The 6th Annual GSR, will focus on four key tools to build the information society as identified by participants in last year’s GSR: Broadband, Spectrum management, international efforts to combat Spam and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).
To continue with our tradition,the first day: will be open to regulators, policy makers, ITU-D Sector Members and other invited guests. The two remianing days will be reserved for regulators and policy makers.

15. Online forum for Regulators and Policy makers
G-REX was started following the recommendation of our first Global Symposium for Regulators in Since its launch in May 2001, G-REX has become very popular as a password-protected website reserved for national regulatory authorities and policy makers. Its main feature has been the Regulators’ Hotline through which regulators and policy makers can pose a question and obtain responses from their colleagues around the world. We know that many regulators in the region use G-REX regularly. We wish to encourage all regulators to join the exchanges on G-REX.
G-REX has also developed virtual real time conferences and text-based ones.
A text based conference on interconnection dispute resolution was held for a couple of weeks in October 2003 moderated by the mini-case studies authors. These past events and discussion conferences are still accessible on GREX, for those of you who are interested in reading what has being said.
The G-REX hotline has been used to post questions such as how to handle consumer disputes. Responses were received from some countries.
If you have any questions on which you would need advice, to learn from others, don’t hesitate, just post it!
Online forum for Regulators and Policy makers
to exchange information and experiences
through Conferences and the Regulators’ Hotline

16. How to register for G-REX
G-REX is a service for regulators and policy makers and welcomes contributions in English, French and Spanish. Any regulator or policy maker interested in registering for G-REX is invited to do so at
Registrations from addresses not affiliated with a regulatory body or policy maker should be confirmed with request on organization’s letter head
G-REX is a service for regulators and policy makers. ITU is pleased to register as many users from each regulatory body and policy maker as those organizations wish to have access to G-REX. There is no limit in the number of users per organization.
The easiest way of registering is to use the electronic registration form at the URL on this slide. If for some reason a prospective user does not have an address from his or her organization, we simply ask that a request on official letterhead be sent to the Regulatory Reform Unit at

17. TREG: http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/treg/
In conclusion, all of our documents, reports, case studies and information on the Regulatory Reform Unit’s activities and events are available on our TREG website!
Just follow the link indicated on the slide.
You will also find on TREG regualtory profiles per country/region. Regulators and Universal service profiles. This section of TREG is only made possible thanks to your responses to our annual regulatory survey. Therefore, to keep these up-to –date, we count on you.
I won’t take more of your time I look forward to our interactive discussions during these three days and would like to encourage you all to take this opportunity to ask as many questions as you wish and to engage in a franc and open dialogue!
I would just like to remind you that all documents for this meeting are also available on TREG website, just click on the Workshop’s link!
Thank you!