Telecom For Dummies

Before your circuit is released to you, your long-distance carrier has to test it to confirm that none of the wiring or cross-connects were forgotten when the circuit was being installed. The final test ensures electrical continuity on the circuit from the long-distance carrier’s hardware to the end of the local loop where your CSU or multiplexer is plugged into it. After the carrier signs off, you need to schedule installation of the circuits. However, before you do that, there are two other issues you need to address: the inside wiring and your cut sheet.

Inside wiring is just as important on a dedicated circuit as it is with a single fax line. You need to ensure that all the required cables and wiring are pulled to the room that holds your phone system. If you have any doubt about what needs to be done to complete the inside wiring of your circuit, check out the inside wiring section of Chapter 4.

Creating a Technical Cut Sheet

Information is rarely where you want it when you need it the most during an emergency. This is why you should draw up a technical cut sheet for every dedicated circuit before it is installed. One week after the circuit is activated, your CFAs, DLRs, and FOCs might end up in the basement of your building. If the circuit fails, you have to run down and dig through the files to find the information.

 Tip  The Cheat Sheet at the beginning of this book contains a starter cut sheet to help you organize the volumes of information about your dedicated service, installation, features, hardware, and contacts.

Wouldn’t you rather have all this information gathered in one document so you don’t have any confusion over who to call or what your circuit IDs are? The cut sheet is typically a simple Excel spreadsheet with the following information listed:

• Physical location of the circuit: You might have hardware in multiple locations that you are responsible for maintaining. Without having the address, you can end up spending two days troubleshooting the wrong circuit.

• Carrier: You may have multiple carriers, as well as local and long-distance circuits. An accurate report of which carriers you have for each circuit prevents confusion when you issue change orders or open trouble tickets.

• Trouble reporting number for your carrier: Every carrier has its own toll-free number for trouble reporting. If you don’t have to call the number every few days, you will forget it when you need it the most. If you keep the number on your cut sheet along with the other information, you won’t have to chase it down.

• Circuit ID(s): These are the most important pieces of information you are given. Any activity that needs to be done on your circuits will be referenced to either the circuit ID or trunk group name.

• Trunk group name: If your carrier is having difficulty finding the circuit ID in its system, the trunk group name is the next best piece of information available to clarify things. Not every document is 100 percent accurate, and if your FOC or CFA was transposed when it was given to you, the trunk group name can help your carrier find your circuit when you are adding service or troubleshooting.

• Account number: Some carriers require you to submit your account number on any document you send that requests a change to your service. Some carriers issue unique account numbers depending on the service you order from them, so you may have multiple account numbers for a single carrier. Whatever the case may be, make sure that you list all account numbers (associated with specific services, of course) in one place.

• Order number: If you are trying to place an order for a change of service a circuit and your carrier can’t find the order by either the circuit ID or the trunk group number, try using the order number of the initial installation — it’s a pretty solid backup for tracking down the circuit. I would like to say that you’ll never have to go this far to help a carrier find your circuit, but it does happen at times.

• Local carrier circuit ID: You should be able to link every circuit ID from the local carrier that installed your loop to the associated circuit ID for your long-distance carrier. This is an especially important thing to do when you have an issue with your long-distance dedicated circuit and a technician from the local carrier is dispatched to correct it. The circuits at your office may only be tagged with the local carrier circuit IDs. If this is true, you need to know which local-circuit ID matches up with which long-distance circuit ID or you might spend time working on the wrong circuit.

• Local carrier trouble reporting numbers (611, toll free, and local number) if you ordered the local loop: If you are the one who ordered the local loop portion of your dedicated circuit, you need this number. Ask for a toll-free number and a direct number for the repair department of your local carrier. The division of your local carrier that handles the troubleshooting of dedicated circuits isn’t a standard option in the carrier’s general directory. You may need to speak to someone in a special division of business service, so you should get the number before you install your circuit.

   Remember  If your long-distance carrier ordered the local portion of the circuit, the local carrier won’t speak to you about troubleshooting issues.

• Configuration (line coding/framing/outpulse signal and start): When you test a dedicated circuit, you should, of course, identify it by its circuit ID and trunk group, but also by its configuration. If you have two circuits that use ISDN, and two that are plain-vanilla in-band E&M Wink, you want to mention which protocol is associated with which dedicated circuit.

• Trunk group configuration: Identify the hunting sequence of your incoming calls, and how many T-1s or individual channels are in each trunk group. The configuration of your circuits may change over time as you upgrade your hardware, add more toll-free numbers, and your company evolves. You should know the most recent incarnation of your circuit so you don’t submit change orders based on a configuration that was changed six months ago.

   Tip  Of course, this means that you need to update your cut sheet every time service, configurations, and protocols change.

• Provisioning contact names and phone numbers: If you need to correct a provisioning error during the installation process or have to submit a change order, these numbers are essential. The provisioning staff is also useful if you have a trouble issue that you need to escalate to a higher management level.

• Any special features on a trunk group: If you have a block on your dedicated circuit to prevent outgoing international calls, or if your carrier has applied special routing features on a specific trunk group, you need to identify the trunk group with the special features. Later, if you need to place an order to remove the international block or other feature, you won’t want to spend five days tracking down which trunk group has to be opened.

• The date the local loop was installed and completed by the local carrier: This date tracks the life of your circuit so you know when the contract term expires. The gestation period of a dedicated circuit may be 45 to 60 days before it is ready to process calls. This time is factored into most contracts for dedicated service so that the 12- or 24-month term actually begins on the date the local loop is installed and is ready to activate, not on the date the contract is signed. Circuits could be delayed by six months before they are installed, and your long-distance carrier doesn’t want to be halfway through a contract period before seeing any traffic on the circuit.

• The date the circuit was installed and accepted: This date tracks the circuit and helps identify the date on which your calls should start appearing on bills from your new carrier. If you have outbound calls on your new dedicated circuit prior to that, you need to investigate further.

• A list of any toll-free numbers on the circuit: Be sure to keep a complete list of all toll-free numbers, and make sure the list links the toll-free numbers with the trunk group (or circuit ID) to which they terminate. Also have information about any overflow configurations that you’ve set up for them.

• A list of special features on toll-free numbers, such as DNIS, ANI Infodigits, and ANI delivery: If you order another circuit to add on to your existing trunk group, you need to know the configuration so that you can ensure the toll-free numbers coming in on the new span receive the same treatment.

• The fees for your local loop or cross-connect: These fess include both monthly recurring charges (MRCs) and installation fees. When you reconcile the invoice from your carrier for your circuit, you need to validate everything you’re being charged. It is much easier to enter a list of fees into one central document than to try and track them down 45 days later when you receive an invoice.

• The hardware vendor’s name and contact information: Any changes you make to your circuit may require your hardware to be reprogrammed. You may also need to contact your hardware vendor if your carrier has isolated an issue to your phone system. There are some phone numbers that you can’t have listed on too many pieces of paper, and this is one of them.

• A section for notes: Every circuit has its idiosyncrasies. Be sure to make note of anything that you believe might helpful at a later date. This section might include the name and phone number of the technician at the carrier that installed the circuit, or any confirmation numbers associated with the installation. If anything was done out of procedure, note it here. For example, maybe a protocol setting or other configuration change (which would normally require a change order and ten days to process) was made on the fly because your carrier was nice enough to make the fix at the time of the installation. If something like this happens, by all means, write it down in your notes. Sometimes special favors aren’t completely documented by the long-distance carrier, and the “corrected” (read “wrong”) configuration may be reset to the requirements listed on the “initial” (read “wrong”) order. Making note of who helped you and what was done will reduce circuit downtime later.

 Tip  After you have transferred all the required information from the CFA and DLR documents (if you ordered your own local loop) or the FOC document (if your long-distance carrier ordered the local loop), your cut sheet is complete, and you are ready to schedule the installation of your circuit. If any of the information is missing from these documents, contact the appropriate carrier to fill out the information. Any information missing in their documentation may indicate that a portion of the circuit that is not complete, so validate everything.

Every carrier has its own procedure for installing circuits, from allowing you to dial up on the fly, to requiring you to schedule 48 hours or more in advance to secure a timeslot. The entire installation process is covered in detail in Chapter 10.