Wholesale: Products & Services

Open Product/Process CR PC053002-2X Detail

 
Title: Supply current rate, new rate and effective date when issuing rate changes (Cross over CR SCR053002 02)
CR Number Current Status
Date
Area Impacted Products Impacted

PC053002-2X Denied
7/18/2002
All
Originator: Stichter, Kathy
Originator Company Name: Eschelon
Owner: Burson, Sue
Director:
CR PM: Thomte, Kit

Description Of Change

Currently when Qwest discovers an error in what it has billed a CLEC or changes a rate it sends a high level notification and then follows with a spreadsheet of the changes. Currently Qwest is populating the spreadsheet with 1minus discount, ending with a percentage or Qwest will provide a tariffed rate rather than the rate less the discount percent that shows up on the invoice. Eschelon asks Qwest to supply the actual incorrect rate (money amount) and the actual correct rate (money amount). Example, if Eschelon is billed $10.00 for a line and the $10.00 is the rate that shows on the bill, and that rate changes to $9.00, then on the notification, Eschelon should see $10.00 as existing rate and $9.00 as new rate. Also, the effective date of the corrected rate should be when the rate was first billed incorrectly. It should not be an effective date made up by Qwest.

Expected Deliverables: Spreadsheets with rate changes should show the actual rate (money amount) being billed incorrectly and not the percentage or tariffed rate. Spreadsheet should show the correct rate that will be billed going forward (money amount). Effective dates should be date when rate was first billed incorrectly.


Date Action Description
5/30/2002 CR Submitted 
5/30/2002 CR Acknowledged 
5/31/2002 Requested Eschelon's availability for clarification call 
6/4/2002 Clarification Meeting Scheduled 
6/6/2002 Clarification Meeting Held 
6/6/2002 Status changed to clarification 
6/6/2002 Cross-over CR created (SCR053002-02) 
6/19/2002 June CMP Meeting: CR status changed to "Presented". Meeting discussions will be set forth in the Product/Process Meeting Minutes to be posted on the CMP Web site. 
7/10/2002 Sent Eschelon initial response 
7/17/2002 July CMP Meeting: CR status changed to "Denied". Meeting minutes posted to this CR's Project Meetings section. 

Project Meetings

07/17/02 - July CMP Meeting Minutes: Qwest (Kriebel) reviewed the response. Qwest has determined that providing the specific rate as opposed to the percentage as it appears in the contract is economically not feasible. Eschelon (Stichter) questioned why so many of the notifications carried the date of November 1. She also asked if the notification carried the date that the change will occur. This CR will carry a "Denied" status.

SCR053002-02 Clarification Meeting

2:00 p.m. (MDT) /Thursday June 6,2002

877 570-8688 Conference ID 7807739

Attendees Name/Company:

Kathy Stichter - Eschelon Michael Buck - Qwest Kit Thomte - Qwest Kristen Hathway Qwest Lynn Stecklein - Qwest

Meeting Agenda: Introduction of Attendees Introductions of the participants on the conference call were made and the purpose of the call was discussed.

Review Requested (Description of) Change Kathy Stichter reviewed the change that Eschelon is requesting as follows: When Qwest discovers an error in what they have billed, they populate the spreadsheet with a discount instead of the actual incorrect rate and correct rate. She also said that the effective date is a random date.

Confirm Areas & Products Impacted This request applies to all products.

Confirm Right Personnel Involved All appropriate personnel are involved in this change request.

Identify/Confirm CLEC’s Expectation Eschelon would like the spreadsheets to reflect the actual rate being billed incorrectly and not the percentage or tariffed rate. Kathy Stichter also said the Eschelon would like the date to reflect the actual effective date, not just any date.

Identify any Dependent Systems Change Requests Michael Buck asked why Eschelon submitted this request as a system change. He explained that a change to a spreadsheet would be considered a process change. Kathy Stichter said that she was not aware that this would be considered a process change or else Eschelon would have submitted a Process CR. Michael Buck said that this change request would be handled as a Cross-over CR and Kathy Stichter said that was not a problem.

Establish Action Plan (Resolution Time Frame) A Cross-over CR will be created (PC053002-2X)


CenturyLink Response

July 8, 2002

Kathy Stichter ILEC Relations Manager Eschelon

SUBJECT: Qwest’s Change Request Response - CR #PC053002-2X Supply current rate and new rate when issuing changes sent to CLECs via spreadsheet. Effective date of correction should go back to when the rate was first billed incorrectly, not an arbitrary date chosen by Qwest as to when the rate is effective.

When Qwest provides CLEC notification for any corrections to a CLEC's billing rates, Qwest provides the current and corrected rate in the manner that it appears in the contract. For UNE rates, facility based OS/DA usage rates and unbundled switching rates, the dollar amount is what is provided in the CLEC contract. So Qwest provides the dollar amount for the current rate and the corrected rate. For Resale (USOC and usage rates) and toll usage rates, the percent discount is the rate provided in the CLEC contract. So for Resale (USOC and usage) and toll usage rate corrections, Qwest provides the percent of Resale (1 minus the Resale percent discount). The CLEC can refer to the Retail Tariff (http://tariffs.uswest.com:8000/) to obtain the actual dollar amount against which the percent discount is applied.

Providing the actual resale (USOC and usage) and toll usage money amounts would be cost prohibitive and could prevent Qwest from correcting rates in the billing system in a timely manner. Providing this additional information on the rate correction CLEC notification would require approximately 50 additional Qwest resources for the CLEC notification process to be completed in a timely manner.

Future rate validation efforts will result in a lesser number and size of notifications than CLEC’s may have received to this point, and thus will be smaller in size of impact to CLEC’s regarding comparing the data to their billing records.

The effective date is provided on all CLEC rate correction notifications. The effective date is generally when the rate was first billed incorrectly (e.g. the contract or cost docket effective date).

If the CLEC has any specific questions regarding a CLEC notification for a rate correction (including the effective date for the rate correction), the CLEC can contact their Qwest Billing Representative.

Partially Denied - Economically not feasible – low demand, cost prohibitive to implement the request, or both.

Sincerely,

Susan Burson Director Process Management Qwest

Cc: Christie Doherty, Judy Taylor, Toni Dubuque, Joan Masztaler


Information Current as of 1/11/2021