A.

Revised Date for 2008 Service Provider Conference Calls
 
Monthly service provider calls will now be held on the first Wednesday of each month. The time, call-in number, and passcode will remain the same.

B.

Funding Commitments for FY2007

USAC has not issued any FY2007 funding waves since the last service provider call. Watch the SL News Brief that is issued each Friday for information about funding waves for the following week.

You can find information on commitments by using the Automated Search of Commitments tool on the USAC website.

Remember that we are posting information on appeal waves and prior year waves for each month in the Applicant Conference Call section of the Outreach and Training webpage.

C.

Service Provider Training - Spring 2008

We are planning to hold two service provider training sessions in April 2008 – one in the East and one in the West. Please let us know if you have any suggestions for locations, subjects to cover, etc.

D.

Form 470 Download Tools

Applicants are continuing to post Forms 470 to the USAC website. You can use the Form 470 Search Posted tool to review individual forms or the Form 470 Download Reports tool to download a comma-delimited file with information from multiple forms. If you have any technical difficulties using these tools, please notify the Client Service Bureau at 1-888-203-8100.

E.

Form 470 Posting Deadline - January 10, 2008

In general, Forms 470 posted after January 10 will not result in Forms 471 eligible for FY2008 E-rate discounts. (A Form 470 posted for a State Replacement Contract is an exception, but very specific guidance applies in that situation.) Applicants that post a Form 470 after this date will not be able to wait the necessary 28 days before selecting a service provider, signing a contract, and signing and submitting a Form 471 by the window close deadline of February 7, 2008.

Invoicing Deadline - January 28, 2008

January 28 is the deadline for submitting an invoice – BEAR Form or SPI Form – for non-recurring services with a service delivery deadline of September 30, 2007. Most of the non-recurring services with this deadline are from FY2007; however, keep in mind that services from previous funding years with service delivery extensions may also be included in this deadline. If a deadline for service delivery or invoicing has been extended, it will appear in the Funding Request Number Extension Table.

Please also log into the E-File System and check to see if any BEAR Forms are waiting for your review and approval.

Form 471 Window Close - February 7, 2008

The deadline for filing Forms 471 for FY2008 is 11:59 p.m. EST on Thursday, February 7. Forms may be certified after this deadline; however, if the Submit button has not been pushed on an online form or a paper form has not been postmarked on or before this date, it will not be considered in-window.

Other – Invoicing Update (not provided during the January 2 call)

Payments for the month of December totaled $117,865,051.20 against requests for $153 M. In total, 5,036 invoices were processed for 1,182 service providers. This represented 24,730 lines in December with 96% being completed within 30 days.

There are 999 lines in process as of Dec 28.

General Questions Received by E-mail

1. We would like to see a Service Provider Training session for Spring 2008 offered somewhere in the central United States. On the last conference call you said they would be held on both coasts.
   
   Thanks for your suggestion. We are planning to hold one session in the East and one in the West, not necessarily on the coasts, at locations that are as convenient as possible to air and surface transportation options.

2. What is holding up Y10 Priority 1 funding decisions?
   
   FY2007 funding waves have not been issued in the latter half of December due to reduced staff availability during the winter holiday period. We expect to resume waves in early to mid-January.

If you have a concern about a specific funding decision, please contact the ombudsman.