§  4.9   Outage reporting requirements—threshold criteria.

   Link to an amendment published at  77 FR 63757 , October 17, 2012.

   (a) Cable. All cable communications providers shall submit
   electronically a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of
   discovering that they have experienced on any facilities that they own,
   operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, an outage of at least 30 minutes
   duration that:

   (1) Potentially affects at least 900,000 user minutes of telephony
   service;

   (2) Affects at least 1,350 DS3 minutes;

   (3) Potentially affects any special offices and facilities (in
   accordance with paragraphs (a) through (d) of §  4.5); or

   (4) Potentially affects a 911 special facility (as defined in paragraph
   (e) of §  4.5), in which case they also shall notify, as soon as
   possible by telephone or other electronic means, any official who has
   been designated by the management of the affected 911 facility as the
   provider's contact person for communications outages at that facility,
   and they shall convey to that person all available information that may
   be useful to the management of the affected facility in mitigating the
   effects of the outage on callers to that facility. (DS3 minutes and
   user minutes are defined in paragraphs (d) and (e) of §  4.7.) Not later
   than 72 hours after discovering the outage, the provider shall submit
   electronically an Initial Communications Outage Report to the
   Commission. Not later than thirty days after discovering the outage,
   the provider shall submit electronically a Final Communications Outage
   Report to the Commission. The Notification and the Initial and Final
   reports shall comply with all of the requirements of §  4.11.

   (b) IXC or LEC tandem facilities. In the case of IXC or LEC tandem
   facilities, providers must, if technically possible, use real-time
   blocked calls to determine whether criteria for reporting an outage
   have been reached. Providers must report IXC and LEC tandem outages of
   at least 30 minutes duration in which at least 90,000 calls are blocked
   or at least 1,350 DS3-minutes are lost. For interoffice facilities
   which handle traffic in both directions and for which blocked call
   information is available in one direction only, the total number of
   blocked calls shall be estimated as twice the number of blocked calls
   determined for the available direction. Providers may use historic
   carried call load data for the same day(s) of the week and the same
   time(s) of day as the outage, and for a time interval not older than 90
   days preceding the onset of the outage, to estimate blocked calls
   whenever it is not possible to obtain real-time blocked call counts.
   When using historic data, providers must report incidents where at
   least 30,000 calls would have been carried during a time interval with
   the same duration of the outage. (DS3 minutes are defined in paragraph
   (d) of §  4.7.) In situations where, for whatever reason, real-time and
   historic carried call load data are unavailable to the provider, even
   after a detailed investigation, the provider must determine the carried
   call load based on data obtained in the time interval between the onset
   of the outage and the due date for the final report; this data must
   cover the same day of the week, the same time of day, and the same
   duration as the outage. Justification that such data accurately
   estimates the traffic that would have been carried at the time of the
   outage had the outage not occurred must be available on request. If
   carried call load data cannot be obtained through any of the methods
   described, for whatever reason, then the provider shall report the
   outage.

   (c) Satellite. (1) All satellite operators shall submit electronically
   a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of discovering that
   they have experienced on any facilities that they own, operate, lease,
   or otherwise utilize, of an outage of at least 30 minutes duration that
   manifests itself as a failure of any of the following key system
   elements: One or more satellite transponders, satellite beams,
   inter-satellite links, or entire satellites. In addition, all
   Mobile-Satellite Service (“MSS”) satellite operators shall submit
   electronically a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of
   discovering that they have experienced on any facilities that they own,
   operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, of an outage of at least 30
   minutes duration that manifests itself as a failure of any gateway
   earth station, except in the case where other earth stations at the
   gateway location are used to continue gateway operations within 30
   minutes of the onset of the failure.

   (2) All satellite communications providers shall submit electronically
   a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of discovering that
   they have experienced on any facilities that they own, operate, lease,
   or otherwise utilize, an outage of at least 30 minutes duration that
   manifests itself as:

   (i) A loss of complete accessibility to at least one satellite or
   transponder;

   (ii) A loss of a satellite communications link that potentially affects
   at least 900,000 user-minutes (as defined in §  4.7(d)) of either
   telephony service or paging service;

   (iii) Potentially affecting any special offices and facilities (in
   accordance with paragraphs (a) through (d) of §  4.5) other than
   airports; or

   (iv) Potentially affecting a 911 special facility (as defined in (e) of
   §  4.5), in which case they also shall notify, as soon as possible by
   telephone or other electronic means, any official who has been
   designated by the management of the affected 911 facility as the
   provider's contact person for communications outages at that facility,
   and they shall convey to that person all available information that may
   be useful to the management of the affected facility in mitigating the
   effects of the outage on callers to that facility.

   (3) Not later than 72 hours after discovering the outage, the operator
   and/or provider shall submit electronically an Initial Communications
   Outage Report to the Commission. Not later than thirty days after
   discovering the outage, the operator and/or provider shall submit
   electronically a Final Communications Outage Report to the Commission.

   (4) The Notification and the Initial and Final reports shall comply
   with all of the requirements of §  4.11.

   (5) Excluded from these outage-reporting requirements are those
   satellites, satellite beams, inter-satellite links, MSS gateway earth
   stations, satellite networks, and transponders that are used
   exclusively for intra-corporate or intra-organizational private
   telecommunications networks, for the one-way distribution of video or
   audio programming, or for other non-covered services (that is, when
   they are never used to carry common carrier voice or paging
   communications).

   (d) Signaling system 7. Signaling System 7 (SS7) providers shall submit
   electronically a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of
   discovering that they have experienced on any facilities that they own,
   operate, lease, or otherwise utilize an outage of at least 30 minutes
   duration that is manifested as the generation of at least 90,000
   blocked calls based on real-time traffic data or at least 30,000 lost
   calls based on historic carried loads. In cases where a third-party SS7
   provider cannot directly estimate the number of blocked calls, the
   third-party SS7 provider shall use 500,000 real-time lost MTP messages
   as a surrogate for 90,000 real-time blocked calls, or 167,000 lost MTP
   messages on a historical basis as a surrogate for 30,000 lost calls
   based on historic carried loads. Historic carried load data or the
   number of lost MTP messages on a historical basis shall be for the same
   day(s) of the week and the same time(s) of day as the outage, and for a
   time interval not older than 90 days preceding the onset of the outage.
   In situations where, for whatever reason, real-time and historic data
   are unavailable to the provider, even after a detailed investigation,
   the provider must determine the carried load based on data obtained in
   the time interval between the onset of the outage and the due date for
   the final report; this data must cover the same day of the week and the
   same time of day as the outage. If this cannot be done, for whatever
   reason, the outage must be reported. Justification that such data
   accurately estimates the traffic that would have been carried at the
   time of the outage had the outage not occurred must be available on
   request. Finally, whenever a pair of STPs serving any communications
   provider becomes isolated from a pair of interconnected STPs that serve
   any other communications provider, for at least 30 minutes duration,
   each of these communications providers shall submit electronically a
   Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of discovering such
   outage. Not later than 72 hours after discovering the outage, the
   provider(s) shall submit electronically an Initial Communications
   Outage Report to the Commission. Not later than thirty days after
   discovering the outage, the provider(s) shall submit electronically a
   Final Communications Outage Report to the Commission. The Notification
   and the Initial and Final reports shall comply with all of the
   requirements of §  4.11.

   (e) Wireless. All wireless service providers shall submit
   electronically a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of
   discovering that they have experienced on any facilities that they own,
   operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, an outage of at least 30 minutes
   duration:

   (1) Of a Mobile Switching Center (MSC);

   (2) That potentially affects at least 900,000 user minutes of either
   telephony and associated data (2nd generation or lower) service or
   paging service;

   (3) That affects at least 1,350 DS3 minutes;

   (4) That potentially affects any special offices and facilities (in
   accordance with paragraphs (a) through (d) of §  4.5) other than
   airports through direct service facility agreements; or

   (5) That potentially affects a 911 special facility (as defined in (e)
   of §  4.5), in which case they also shall notify, as soon as possible by
   telephone or other electronic means, any official who has been
   designated by the management of the affected 911 facility as the
   provider's contact person for communications outages at that facility,
   and they shall convey to that person all available information that may
   be useful to the management of the affected facility in mitigating the
   effects of the outage on callers to that facility. (DS3 minutes and
   user minutes are defined in paragraphs (d) and (e) of §  4.7.) In
   determining the number of users potentially affected by a failure of a
   switch, a concentration ratio of 8 shall be applied. For providers of
   paging service solely, however, the following outage criteria shall
   apply instead of those in paragraphs (b)(1) through (b)(3) of this
   section. Notification must be submitted if the failure of a switch for
   at least 30 minutes duration potentially affects at least 900,000
   user-minutes. Not later than 72 hours after discovering the outage, the
   provider shall submit electronically an Initial Communications Outage
   Report to the Commission. Not later than thirty days after discovering
   the outage, the provider shall submit electronically a Final
   Communications Outage Report to the Commission. The Notification and
   the Initial and Final reports shall comply with all of the requirements
   of §  4.11.

   (f) Wireline. All wireline communications providers shall submit
   electronically a Notification to the Commission within 120 minutes of
   discovering that they have experienced on any facilities that they own,
   operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, an outage of at least 30 minutes
   duration that:

   (1) Potentially affects at least 900,000 user minutes of either
   telephony or paging;

   (2) Affects at least 1,350 DS3 minutes;

   (3) Potentially affects any special offices and facilities (in
   accordance with paragraphs (a) through (d) of §  4.5); or

   (4) Potentially affects a 911 special facility (as defined in paragraph
   (e) of §  4.5), in which case they also shall notify, as soon as
   possible by telephone or other electronic means, any official who has
   been designated by the management of the affected 911 facility as the
   provider's contact person for communications outages at that facility,
   and the provider shall convey to that person all available information
   that may be useful to the management of the affected facility in
   mitigating the effects of the outage on efforts to communicate with
   that facility. (DS3 minutes and user minutes are defined in paragraphs
   (d) and (e) of §  4.7.) Not later than 72 hours after discovering the
   outage, the provider shall submit electronically an Initial
   Communications Outage Report to the Commission. Not later than thirty
   days after discovering the outage, the provider shall submit
   electronically a Final Communications Outage Report to the Commission.
   The Notification and the Initial and Final reports shall comply with
   all of the requirements of §  4.11.

   (g) Interconnected VoIP Service Providers. (1) All interconnected VoIP
   service providers shall submit electronically a Notification to the
   Commission:

   (i) Within 240 minutes of discovering that they have experienced on any
   facilities that they own, operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, an
   outage of at least 30 minutes duration that potentially affects a 9-1-1
   special facility (as defined in (e) of §  4.5), in which case they also
   shall notify, as soon as possible by telephone or other electronic
   means, any official who has been designated by the management of the
   affected 9-1-1 facility as the provider's contact person for
   communications outages at that facility, and the provider shall convey
   to that person all available information that may be useful to the
   management of the affected facility in mitigating the effects of the
   outage on efforts to communicate with that facility; or

   (ii) Within 24 hours of discovering that they have experienced on any
   facilities that they own, operate, lease, or otherwise utilize, an
   outage of at least 30 minutes duration:

   (A) That potentially affects at least 900,000 user minutes of
   interconnected VoIP service and results in complete loss of service; or

   (B) That potentially affects any special offices and facilities (in
   accordance with paragraphs §  4.5(a) through (d)).

   (2) Not later than thirty days after discovering the outage, the
   provider shall submit electronically a Final Communications Outage
   Report to the Commission. The Notification and Final reports shall
   comply with all of the requirements of §  4.11.

   [ 69 FR 70338 , Dec. 3, 2004, as amended at  77 FR 25097 , Apr. 27, 2012]

   Effective Date Note: At  77 FR 25097 , Apr. 27, 2012, §  4.9 was amended
   by adding paragraph (g). This paragraph contains information collection
   and recordkeeping requirements and will not become effective until
   approval has been given by the Office of Management and Budget.

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