Romanian telecom operator Romtelecom, owned by Greek OTE Group, posted an operating loss of EUR 13.9 million in the third quarter of 2010 and its revenues dropped by 6.5 percent, to EUR 181.5 million, because of austerity measures and rising unemployment.  "In the third quarter, the Romanian consumer environment was once again negatively impacted by decreasing household income, higher sales tax, and rising unemployment, as well as a higher than expected rate of inflation," OTE said in a report Thursday.

In the same period last year, Romtelecom had revenues of EUR 194.2 million and an operating profit of EUR 8 million.  Romtelecom general manager Yorgos Ioannidis (in picture) said the operator will continue to launch offers allowing clients to deal with the limitations of the economic crisis as such offers launched in summer have been well received.

The number of fixed telephony lines operate by the company decreased 6.3 percent  from October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010, to 2.6 million. The costs of a voluntary layoff program the company is running stood at EUR 23.7 million in the first nine months compared to EUR 5.1 million in the same period in 2009.

OTE, owned by the Greek state and Germany's Deutsche Telekom, is also present in Romania through the local division of mobile operator Cosmote and the local chain of Germanos stores, which sell IT&C products.

Mediafax