Out of the 2110 lifts in the capital’s residential blocks, over 1100, which are under the management of “Liftservice” municipal enterprise, have their 25-year exploitation term expired, reports Info-Prim Neo. According to company director Ion Stanciu, over 40 elevators have been used for 40 years or more. “The interstate standards dictate that elevators should be changed every 25 years. Regrettably, with the 2-3 million lei we get from the City Hall, we can only replace two or three elevators per year. Thus, we changed three lifts in 2010, two in 2011, and this year we plan to replace two more. Another nine elevators are undergoing general reparation”, said Ion Stanciu. The price for a new elevator is €20,000, claims the “Liftservice” director, and in order to replace all of the capital’s elevators, we need billions. In order to keep the elevators running, they are undergoing maintenance every now and then, change parts being brought from Belarus. According to Ion Stanciu, 80% of the elevators in 9-floor blocks are brought from Belarus. The most common type of complaints is not related to the security of the lifts, but to the fact that they malfunction very often. The repair service may visit the same address up to 10 times a day. “They should elaborate a 5-10 year State policy which would oversee the replacement of lifts over 25 years of age; such a policy has been implemented in our neighbor-states, Romania and Ukraine. We’ve made several proposals to the Ministry of Economy to get funds that would allow us to replace at least 50-60 lifts per year, but haven’t gotten any response. In this situation, we are trying to manage with what the City Hall offers us from its own poverty; we’ve been doing our best for 4 years now”, added Ion Stanciu. Repair services receive around 15 calls a day related to malfunctioning lifts. The issues are usually solved by mechanics from the accidents division.