Evaluating Your Local Loop Choices

 Remember   In a perfect world, you order a dedicated circuit from your long-distance carrier, the long-distance carrier contracts with the local carrier in your area, and the circuit is delivered. Local loops set up like this, with only one local carrier, are called type 1 circuits . Unfortunately, this isn’t always how things play out. Sometimes, the territory for your local carrier stops short of the POP where your long-distance carrier is located. Your local carrier then must contract with the neighboring local carrier to connect to the POP in what’s called a type 2 circuit . It can get even worse if your long-distance carrier doesn’t have the facilities available to receive the local loop from the second local carrier, and has to contract with a third local carrier ( type 3 circuit ).

All these circuit types are relevant to you because every time you add another local carrier to the loop, you can expect to add 15 days to the installation date of your circuit. Every carrier adds more possibility for error in provisioning the circuit, because the order now must run through another company’s order system. And, of course, there’s always the ka-ching factor: a higher local loop cost per month, and more difficulty if you ever have to troubleshoot the circuit. If you can avoid a type 2 or 3 circuit, it’s in your best interest to do so.

Speeding Up Order Processing?

If your order is moving slowly, or if you’re under a time constraint, you might be tempted to ask the carrier to expedite your order. Although this idea seems good in theory, you need to ask two questions before you commit to expediting an order:

• How much is the expedite fee? The cost to speed things up can be anywhere from $500 to $5,000 per order, or per circuit. After you know what the expedite fee is and the daily savings you expect when it’s installed, you can ask the second question.

• What exactly do you get when the carrier expedites the order? Many carriers won’t guarantee you anything more than increased visibility on an expedited order. The manager or director of the provisioning department is now aware of the order’s existence, and may move it to the top of the pile for provisioning and design, but that’s hardly worth $5,000. If you have no guarantee that the circuit will be installed any quicker than it would be if you simply pick up the phone and make a nagging phone call to the carrier every two days, don’t spend the money. A little diplomacy and persistence on your part can give the order the same visibility by the upper management, without paying the expedite fee.

   Remember   If you are ordering a long-distance circuit, the fee for expediting an order doesn’t generally cover expediting the process at the local carrier level. If you want a circuit expedited at that level, you have to open up your checkbook — wide. Fees for expediting the process with local carriers are generally much higher than those charged by long-distance carriers; some carriers even ask for a blank check so they can tell you the fee after the work is done. Like long-distance carriers, you’re given a rather flimsy guarantee that the order will be pushed along, but you won’t see
  a commitment that your circuit will be installed a week, a day, or an hour earlier than the carrier’s original estimate.

   Warning!   The one point that both local and long-distance carriers commit to when you ask for an expedited order is the fact that you will be charged for it. Will the order actually be done faster? Who knows ? All bets are off.