Summary: The Romanian Access to Information Law Does Not Cover Self-Funded Bodies
| Request sent to | National Trade Register (Click here) |
| Outcome of request | Information refused. |
| Time taken to respond | 3 working days (Deadline is 10 working days) |
| Reason for refusal | Only need to answer requests for individual records. Must pay for access. FOI exceptions applied to registers. |
On 30 July 2013 an initial request was sent in Romanian to the National Trade Register by Access Info´s partner, Ionut Stanescu. Romanian law requires the administration to answer access to information requests within a 10 working day period.
On 4 August 2013, the Romanian Trade Register asked us to clarify our request and specify the category and type of information we wanted to obtain. A clarification was sent in which we explained that we were seeking access to the full dataset held by the National trade register for free.
On 16 August 2013 the National Trade Register responded that all the information that was freely available to the public was already available on their website. According to the law, journalists can access additional information in the company register free of charge, but members of the public cannot. The Trade Register also stated that they were only obliged to answer to “punctual” requests for specific pieces of information.
In Romania, there is no administrative appeal for access to information requests, which means that you need to take a case directly to the Administrative Court. Access Info decided not to do this because in Romania, there is a provision in the access to information law which excludes self-funded bodies from the scope of the law, and the Romanian Company Register is fully self-financed by the fees it collects, both from registrants, and from those who access the information in the register.
Accessing the Romanian Company Register
| Information available (for free) |
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| Provision for public access | You must pay for access to basic company information and Annual reports though journalists can access this information for free. Names of shareholders are also available upon payment, as is other information such as the date of birth, nationality, ID number, etc of registered company representatives. Past information about a company can only be accessed on site, after filling in a form at the Company Register Headquarters. |
| Cost per record | Currently, information about companies is available for buying online in two different packages. The cheaper package costs 8 RON (approximately 2 Euros) and contains: ID number of company, address, main activity, date of incorporation, status, name of directors, their date of birth and place of birth, name of shareholders, their date of birth and place of birth. The larger package costs 24 RON (approximately 6 Euros) and contains: all of the above + secondary addresses of the company, abridged financial data, other mentions which vary in length and preciseness from one case to another. The latter are not very strictly organized and sometimes are hard to read through. |
| Cost for whole database | Bulk access is not possible. |
Additional Information:
Romania´s Right to Information (RTI) Rating (Click here)
Romania´s Law on Free Access to Public Information (Click here)
Romania’s company register (Click here)