Transport is a complex and permanent process, which forms a functional unit that is accomplished by the interaction of technical and commercial operating factors.

The transport process has a finality determined by the conditions stipulated in the legislation by which the transport necessities of the national economy are satisfied.

The place, which the commercial operating has in the railway transport, a basic component of the Romanian economy, justifies the special interest for its evaluation. The commercial operating is in a transit process, being marked by the road from a centralized economy, based on the state property to a free market economy, based on private property.

There are two moments, which are highlighted in the process of placing the commercial operating on new coordinates:

• 27 October 1997 – the effective date of the “Transport Regulation on the railways in Romania”, approved by Government Ordinance;
• 10 May 1999 – the effective date of the “Uniform Norms for the application of the Transport Regulation on the railways in Romania”, approved by Government Ordinance no. 1/1997.

The main provisions of the Transport Regulation in regard to the new demands of the commercial operating couldn’t be set into practice due to the lack of the application norms. Starting on 10 May this year they switched in fact to the transport based on the principles of the free market economy, based on private property.

Some of the most important achievements are:

1. The tariffs of railway transport for goods are formed freely on the market, as a result of Art. 55 from the Emergency Ordinance of the Government no. 12/1998 in regard to the transport on the Romanian railways and the reorganizing of SNCFR. These are established according to the Transport Regulation, so as to cover the costs of transport and to ensure a minimum profit.
2. The area of services executed by the transporter as the result of the express demand of the client has widened by changing the compulsory rendering related to goods expedition into negotiable ones, which are executed by the railways against the payment of the related tariffs.

1. This group comprises the weighing of wagon expeditions within the limits of the means the transporter disposes of, excepting the cases when the obligation of the railways in regard to this operation were maintained. Economic agents will be interested in contracting such rendering, taking into account that the procedure of recognizing the railway scales was abrogated.
2. The sealing of the wagons which according to the new regulations is an obligation of the expeditor, may be performed by the railways against the payment of the rendering in the cases stipulated in the “Uniform Norms”.
3. The certification of goods expeditions at the head office of the addressee also changed into a service, which the railways may perform against the related tariff. The current regulations have restricted the obligation of the railways in regard to the certification at the posting of the respective dates on the board of the station.

1. The extension of using the negotiations between the client and transporter in order to establish on contractual way the mutual rights and obligations.

1. The regulations in regard to the frame-convention of loading-unloading is concluded by the clients with the railway transporter when stable business relations are settled among them.

The convention regulates:

• the scheduling of the transports;
• the ensuring of loading and unloading;
• the certification of transports;
• the method of paying the transports.

1. The centralized payment convention of transports which can be a form of the frame-contract of loading-unloading, which regulates the payment methods of the transport prices.

1. The regulation of using in time the transport means at loading-unloading and in other cases as a service for which the hour tariff for usage is paid.

Thus, by balancing the services with the tariffs, the client is co-interested in the rational usage of the transport means and the transport cashes his monetary rights according to the time used by the client for his services.