As of September, UOKiK will begin publishing information on court rulings applying to its decisions as part of its transparency agenda.

Poland’s Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) will publish court rulings on decisions it has issued in cases of competition-restricting practices, merger control, violation of the collective consumer interests and the use of abusive clauses. Rulings that have both upheld and overturned the Authority’s decisions or reduced fines it has levied will be covered. UOKiK will begin publishing press releases to summarise rulings that have a significant bearing on the market or consumers. To complement these measures a database and search tools for all court rulings is slated for a November launch.

2015 rulings review

Since the beginning of 2015, the Court of Competition and Consumer Protection (SOKiK) and the Court of Appeal in Warsaw have issued 174 rulings on UOKiK decisions. The courts have upheld 108 of the Authority’s decisions, changed 37 and overturned 29.

One of the most significant of the overturned cases was UOKiK’s decision regarding an agreement the Authority identified as illegal between the four largest mobile telephony providers operating in Poland — Polkomtel, Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa (currently T-Mobile), PTK Centertel (currently Orange), and P4. UOKiK found that the participants in this consortium, after losing a competition, illegally colluded to agree upon a coordinated approach in their dealings with their victorious rival. The four entities exchanged confidential information and also agreed how they would publically question the competitor’s wholesale offers. In June, SOKiK overturned UOKiK’s decision, adopting the position that the operators’ behaviour was lawful and that UOKiK, having permitted the creation of the consortium, could not subsequently investigate the legality of its actions. Having considered the written reasoning for SOKiK’s judgment, UOKiK filed an appeal.  

Additional information for the media:

Press Office, UOKiK
Pl. Powstańców Warszawy 1, 00-950 Warsaw
Phone.: +48 22 827 28 92, +48 22 55 60 314, +48 22 55 60 430
E-mail: [SCODE]Yml1cm9wcmFzb3dlQHVva2lrLmdvdi5wbA==[ECODE]