The number of companies in Sofia choosing their refuse to be transported by competitors of cleaning services concessionaires Wolf, DITZ and Chistota Sofia continued to grow. For 2008, 903 companies have chosen to use alternative transportation for their refuse, compared to 730 in 2007, representatives of Sofia Municipality announced as reported by Dnevnik daily. Among them were some of the biggest Sofia companies, store chains and petrol stations.

The number of companies offering the service has gone up from 43 to 52. However, the amount of refuse they will transport annually to the Souhodol refuse dump, has increased by 50 per cent to about 60 000 tons per year.

Shele Bulgaria has the biggest share in this market, followed by Alara 2000, Iron and Choo.

Since 2005, owners and users of non-residential buildings can choose to have their refuse transported by a company different from the concessionaires. The option was introduced at the insistence of the Confederation of Employers and Industrialists in Bulgaria. At the time the concessionaires filed a court case against the Sofia Municipality for allowing competitors onto the market. However, they lost this court case.

Companies would save only a part of the waste disposal fee through direct contracting. Out of the 12 promilles due over the tax appraisal value of the property, a mere 4.5 promilles are used for transportation of refuse. The companies are obliged to pay the remaining 7.5 promilles to the municipality for the cleaning of streets by Wolf, DITZ and Chistota Sofia. Businesses claimed it still saved a quarter of the refuse fee by working with alternative cleaning companies because it would pay half the amount for refuse transportation. This applied especially to companies with many, mostly new buildings, since the tax appraisal value of their properties was much higher.

Paying 12 promilles over the property's value is advantageous only to companies with old buildings, since their tax base is low. The companies have a third option as well, namely to pay for the number of containers transported.

The refuse fee for companies and residential buildings in Sofia would not be raised in 2008, Sofia deputy mayor for finance Minko Gerdjikov said as reported by Dnevnik daily. In 2007 citizens paid two promilles over the tax appraisal value of the property. If the municipal councillors decide to increase the tax appraisal value of properties, the promilles would be reduced, Gerdjikov promised.

The three concession contracts for the cleaning of Sofia were property of the Equest investment fund for almost a year now, Dnevnik daily said. When the fund bought the concession from Roumen Gaitanski, it promised to clean better and to introduce a GPS system to monitor how often and what amount of refuse the trucks transport. However, this did not happen during the past year.

At the beginning of 2009, one of the concession contracts for half of Sofia expires. Therefore, in 2008 the municipality has to make a serious analysis of the concession and to decide what form of contracting to choose for the future, Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) municipal councillor Vili Lilkov warned. According to him Sofia could go back to the option of having a municipally owned enterprise cleaning the city, Dnevnik daily said.