ONE of Telecom's leading rivals claims it has lost up to £500,000 because of delays by the State operator in providing it with leased lines.

The company, TCL Telecom, says delays in getting the lines is detrimental to both its business and its clients.

TCL, which provides telecoms services to corporate customers must lease its circuits from Telecom. It says it carried out a survey and found that the average time it takes for Telecom to provide the two megabyte circuits is 11 weeks. The circuits are used to connect TCL's switches with those of its customers.

TCL managing director, Mr Sean Melly, said his company was asked to carry out the survey by the Department of Transport Energy and Communications. The Department asked TCL to do so when TCL raised the issue of delays.

The survey listed all leased lines ordered by TCL from Telecom for the period January 1996-April 1997. The average delivery time of 11 weeks compared to just two weeks in London, Mr Melly said.

He said the delays meant that companies were losing, on average, savings of 30 per cent on their telecommunications expenditure because of Telecom's delays and TCL was immediately put at a competitive disadvantage in the market. _

Mr Melly said that even if Telecom provided leased lines within four weeks, it would be a huge improvement on the current situation.

A spokesman for Telecom disputed TCL's figures, maintaining that the average time for supplying circuits was five to seven weeks. He said it could be quicker in some parts of Dublin, or take longer, depending on the infrastructure needed.

The spokesman said TCL was treated in the same manner as all Telecom's customers. Telecom was working very hard to provide the service as quickly as possible, he said.

He added that providing leased lines in 10 working days in London, was the very best timeframe possible. But it can also take several weeks to supply circuits there, he said.

From July, companies such as TCL will be able to use alternative infrastructure networks to carry their business traffic, thereby lessening their dependency on Telecom. Already British Telecom is negotiating with the ESB to use its infrastructure.

However, industry sources do not believe that the liberalisation of the market driven by the EU - will result in any immediate big bang. It will not necessarily be viable for all Telecom's rivals to establish their own alternative networks. Even where they do set up their own routes, there would be a time factor involved.