RAI wins class action landmark DTT case
September 19, 2013
From Branislav Pekic in Rome
Italian public broadcaster RAI and its transmission unit Rai Way have won the first class action brought against them by a group of DTT subscribers.
The case brought by 123 subscribers came before the Administrative Regional Court of Lazio. They demanded the repayment of three years of TV licence fee, i.e. from the start of the transition from analogue to digital terrestrial TV in the region of Emilia Romagna. However, the Court ruled in favour of Rai and Rai Way, stating that there is no disruption in the digital terrestrial broadcasts.
Rai Way had produced its own fact-finding investigation saying 99.6 per cent of users in the province of Ravenna successfully receives the signal. Any reception problems, according to the Court, result from the installations of the individual users.
The citizens of Ravenna are not giving up and are planning to appeal to the Council of State.