The Competition, Regulation and Supervision Court (TCRS) confirmed ANACOM's decision to impose fines on MEO, NOS and Vodafone for raising prices and failing to inform their customers that they had the right to terminate their contracts free of charge if they did not agree with the proposed price increase.
The rulings of the Competition Court in favour of ANACOM were handed down between June (ruling regarding NOS), September (MEO) and October (Vodafone). In all cases, the court essentially upheld ANACOM's decisions, only adjusting the amount of the fines imposed. Regarding NOS, the fine was increased to 4.2 million euros, regarding Vodafone, the amount was increased to 2 million euros, and regarding MEO, the amount was set at 5.3 million euros.
NOS, MEO and Vodafone have already appealed these court rulings to the Lisbon Court of Appeal.
ANACOM's decisions date back to November 2022https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1733953 when ANACOM imposed a single fine in the amount of 5.2 million euros on NOS, a single fine of 6.7 million euros on MEO and a single fine of over 3 million euros on Vodafone, as it was proven that they failed to inform subscribers of their right to terminate their contracts free of charge if they did not agree with the proposed price increase. In the instances involving MEO and NOS, the issue also pertained to inadequately communicating the proposed price increase. In some situations, subscribers were only informed about the precise amount of the price increase long after being notified that the prices would increase. In other cases, the precise amount of the proposed increase was not provided in the manner and at the location specified in the notice of the contractual change. The NOS case also proved that subscribers were not informed of the proposed price increase at least 30 days in advance.
