2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE TWENTY-SEVEN - Public Service (§§ 1 — 2641) › PART II - Communications (§§ 265 — 539) › Chapter 19 - Puerto Rico Telecommunications Act of 1996 (§§ 265 — 272) › Subchapter I - General Provisions (§§ 265 — 265a) › § 265 - Statement of public policy

It shall be the public policy of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico to:
(a) Acknowledge the telecommunications service as one whose rendering pursues a high public interest within a competitive market;
(b) provide universal service at a fair, reasonable, and affordable rate for all citizens;
(c) distribute the duties, responsibilities, and obligations inherent to the development and preservation of universal service equitably among all telecommunications companies;
(d) establish specific, predictable, and sufficient support mechanisms to preserve and develop universal service;
(e) promote the investment of capital in the development of the telecommunications infrastructure;
(f) ensure the availability of the broadest range of competitive possibilities in the offering of telecommunications services and facilities;
(g) promote competition and use the market forces as key factors in determining the prices, terms, availability, and conditions of the service;
(h) [promote] interconnection and interoperability among telecommunications companies;
(i) ensure that no regulatory barriers or unnecessary administrative procedures exist which hamper competition in the market;
(j) simplify the regulatory process in those situations in which regulation is necessary, and gear such regulations to the promotion of the consumer’s welfare and to penalize for anti-competitive practices in the telecommunications market;
(k) regulate service providers in a manner compatible to their standing in the market and the influence they exert on customers;
(l) promote the establishment of cost-based pricing, so that consumers pay for the services they are really receiving, pursuant to what is provided or authorized by the Federal Communications Act;
(m) eliminate direct or indirect subsidies between competitive and noncompetitive services, as well as prohibit any other subsidy which allows for unreasonably low prices to be sustained, whose purpose is to reduce competition or undermine a competitor;
(n) protect the right to privacy of the subscribers of telecommunications services and assure that the constitutional and legal provisions which guarantee this right are complied with;
(o) concentrate the primary jurisdiction with regard to the regulation of the telecommunications field in a single agency of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico;
(p) govern its regulation process by the so-called forbearance process, as the Federal Act has established for providers of telecommunications service, performing its duty as guardian of the competitive environment and allowing for said environment to indeed regulate, in the first instance, the conduct of participating companies. The companies shall, in turn, commit themselves to seek, also in the first instance, negotiated solutions for controversies among them, resorting to administrative and/or judiciary forums if all bona fide negotiation efforts have been exhausted;
(q) give access to telecommunications services which can be reasonably compared to those provided in urban areas to consumers throughout the Island, including low-income consumers and those living in rural areas or in areas where access to such services is costly;
(r) guarantee the enjoyment of the service offered, without fear of unreasonable interruptions or interference;
(s) guarantee the nondiscriminatory rendering of services regardless of race, sex, origin, religion, or political affiliation;
(t) guarantee all subscribers that service shall not be discontinued unless there is just cause, and in each case, only after due notice;
(u) guarantee the utmost promptness in the re-establishment of service when the same is inevitably interrupted. Should said interruptions continue beyond a reasonable period of time, the telecommunications companies shall provide credit of the corresponding portion of the basic rate;
(v) guarantee that all controversies on billing or services be handled in an equitable and diligent manner, and
(w) ensure that no law or regulations of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico or municipal ordinance limits, prohibits or has the effect to limit or prohibit the capacity of a telecommunications company to provide competitive telecommunications services at intrastate or interstate level.
History —Sept. 12, 1996, No. 213, § I-2.