ROME (MF-Dow Jones)--An Italian court Friday ordered that a two-month trial period of a new mobile service from Vodafone Group's Italian unit should be suspended.
The service, called Vodafone Casa, which allows customers to receive work and home landline calls on their mobile phones, would have been available only to 15,000 Vodafone users, according to a decision of the Italian Communication Ministry.
A Rome administrative court Friday blocked the execution of the ministry's decision to allow the service on a trial basis, upholding a complaint filed by rival Telecom Italia.
A Rome court had originally blocked the offer last November on the grounds that the UK company was promising customers that they could transfer their old Telecom Italia number to the new service, a practice not permitted in Italy if the operators use different networks.
The Italian government agreed with this ruling, but had allowed the service to be tested for two months using only Vodafone numbers and for a select group of users.
The new Vodafone offer would have enabled customers to answer on their mobile phones calls made to a fixed-line number of their choice. The person calling would be charged normal fixed-line rates, while the call would be answered free of charge on the mobile.
-By Giada Zampano, Dow Jones Newswires; +39 02 5821 9907; giada.zampano@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires"
Posted to the site on 2nd February 2007
Posted to: www.cellular-news.com/story/21765.php