A.

Funding Commitments for FY2006 and FY2005
 
Funding Year 2006

We are issuing funding decisions on FY2006 Priority 2 requests at 87% and above.

Wave  FCDL Date   Amount

039   1/18/2007   $29.4 M
040   1/23/2007   $19.3 M
041   1/30/2007   $29.7 M
042   2/6/2007    $38.6 M

Funding Year 2005

Letters of explanation will be going out in the next few weeks on all funding requests for which decisions have not yet been issued.

66A   2/7/2007    $5.2 M

B.

FY2007 Window Update

The Form 471 application filing window was extended an additional day – to 11:59 p.m. EST on Thursday, February 8 - due to a server problem that occurred during the morning on February 7. Note that Forms 471 filed but not certified within the window can still be certified and considered as filed within the window. Within the next two weeks, USAC will be sending out a notification letter to applicants that can take advantage of this opportunity. This letter will give them guidance on how to submit certifications and establish the deadline for them to act.

USAC is processing paper applications and paper certifications as quickly as possible in order to prepare the demand estimate for FY2007 funding requests for the FCC. USAC posts the demand estimate on its website after it is submitted to the FCC.

C.

Update on Letters

Form 471 Receipt Acknowledgment Letter (RAL)

The applicant RAL for FY2007 has been reformatted to make it easy for applicants to make allowable corrections to certain fields on their Forms 471. They can copy the RAL, write in corrections, sign and date the copy, and submit it to USAC. You should check your copy of the RAL as well. If you notice that a funding amount is off by an order of magnitude, or a discount seems wrong, it wouldn’t hurt to contact your customer and provide that information.

Applicants can make allowable corrections using the RAL process and also during PIA review. Note that USAC cannot identify all errors. For example, an applicant may have meant to list 47 schools on a Block 4 worksheet but actually listed 49. Even so, applicants can still make these allowable corrections - as well as those that USAC identifies - either with the RAL correction process or during PIA review.

Form 486 and Alaska Gateway

All of the database updates should now be complete for applicants who received relief under the Alaska Gateway order (DA 06-1871, released September 14, 2006). Basically, these applicants include:

1. Appellants specifically mentioned in the order.
2. FY2005 and FY2006 applicants.
3. Applicants from earlier funding years whose last date to invoice was on or after September 14, 2006.

The relief provided was:

1. For applicants who filed a late Form 486 and had their service start date changed as a result, USAC reset the service start date to the original date reported on the Form 486 and restored funding if it had been reduced.
2. For applicants who have not yet filed a Form 486 or who filed a Form 486 online but did not certify that form, USAC notified them by letter that they had 20 days to do so without penalty. If they do not file within that time period, the normal penalty will apply. (Note that, if services have not yet started or just started recently, the Form 486 might not yet be late.)
3. Going forward, USAC uses the date of the FCDL and the service start date reported on the Form 471 to calculate when a Form 486 might be late, and will notify applicants by letter that they have 20 days to file this form. (Note that, if the service start date has been delayed from the original planned date, the Form 486 might not yet be late.)

So, at this point:

1. Applicants and service providers should have received revised Form 486 Notification Letters for any FRNs with service start dates modified under this guidance. In many cases, the change of service start date may mean that some funding has been restored and USAC can be invoiced for that funding if those services have been delivered.
2. If you’re not sure about the service start date for an FRN, check the Data Retrieval Tool.

486 Rejection Letters

Random samples of Forms 486 are reviewed for compliance with technology plan rules. If the applicant is found to be out of compliance with those rules, the Form 486 is rejected and a Form 486 Rejection Letter is sent. If an applicant is later able to come into compliance, the applicant can submit a new Form 486 for services delivered on or after the date of compliance. (For example, if the applicant had a technology plan but the plan was not approved when the Form 486 was filed, the applicant can submit the plan for approval, get proof of the approval, and then file a new Form 486 for services delivered on or after the approval date.) More information on these letters is available in the January 26, 2007 Schools and Libraries News Brief.

FRNs for basic telephone service can be processed even if an applicant is not in compliance with technology plan rules; however, they must be resubmitted on a separate Form 486. Applicants will be notified by letter if they are permitted to do this.

D.

Update on Service Provider Training

At present, we intend to hold two one-day training sessions - one in Chicago and one in Atlanta - in the last half of April 2007. Our focus will be on information that service providers need to know and conducted by taking into account the service provider point of view.

When we have specific details, we will post registration information on our website and announce the training in the weekly Schools and Libraries News Brief.

E.

Update on Two-in-Five Guidance

USAC plans to post guidance soon on how to remove entities from a Block 4 worksheet. This is important for applicants whose funding may be at risk because of one or more entities included on a Block 4 worksheet that have already used two of their five years under the Two-in-Five Rule.

Invoicing Update / Online BEAR Update

Invoicing Update

Payments for the month of January totaled $130,865,054.40 against requests for $169.9M. In total, 8,172 invoices were processed for 1,498 service providers. This represented 33,527 lines in January with 100% being completed within 30 days and NO lines over 30 days.

There are currently less than 20 in-process lines over 30 days out of 517 lines in process.

The invoice deadline for all Funding Year 2005 non-extended FRNs (January 29, 2007) has passed. Even though the number of invoices received in January was larger than usual, the changes implemented over the last year allowed us to meet our objective of payment within 30 days.

Online BEAR Update

The Online BEAR form has been live for almost three months. In addition to certifying a BEAR Form online, you can also access historical information on BEAR Forms using the Bulk Download feature.

If your customers use BEAR Forms, you should log into the ECert system on a regular basis to see if you have any Online BEARs waiting for your review and approval. You can access the E-Cert system by following the “Form 498” or “Form 499-A” links on the USAC Forms page or the “Certify BEAR Online” link on the Required Forms page. If you are having difficulty with the E-cert system, please contact our customer service group at 1-888-641-8722.

USAC sends you an email notification email from no-reply@saic.com when one of your customers files a BEAR Form online. Please make a note of this email address so that you can check to see that the email is not blocked by your system.

Applicants who are new to the program and who recently filed a Form 470 or Form 471 for the first time will be getting a PIN. These PINs are for applicant use and also allow your customers to have access to all online applicant forms, including the online BEAR Form. You may want to work with these customers to help them understand the BEAR process.

Reminder: you do not need to file on paper any BEAR Form that you approve online. You may, if you wish, print and retain paper copies of the form but you are not required to do so.

We are aware of differences in the phone numbers featured on the printable BEAR Form; we are working on a fix.

Other

No items.

General Questions Received by E-mail

No questions received.