Mass Service Disruptions
If a provider proposes to rely on an exemption from the Telecommunications
(Customer Service Guarantee) Standard 2000 (No. 2) (under section
22), it must either individually notify the affected customers or
it must publish a public notice in a newspaper advising of the exemption.
Mass Service Disruption (MSD) is the term used when a provider
publishes a notice advising the areas & number ranges in relation
to which it is claiming an exemption from the Customer Service Guarantee
(CSG).
Usually, an MSD is declared where mass outages have occurred due
to extreme weather conditions or other factors beyond a carrier's
control. In order for a provider to claim an exemption (either MSD
or individual) for extreme weather, the weather conditions must
meet one of the criteria specified in Schedule 3 of the CSG Standard.
It is a requirement of section 24 of the CSG Standard that if a
Carriage Service Provider (CSP) intends to rely on an MSD exemption
it must publish a public notice that includes the service numbers
affected within 9 working days. The CSP must also notify the TIO
and ACMA of the starting date of the exemption within 8 working
days. If a CSP is a reseller, it must comply with the above notice
requirements within 2 working days of receiving notification from
the supplier from which it acquires the service.
An exemption is considered to be provisional until the provider
complies with the notice provisions. If a CSP does not comply with
these timeframes, the CSP must pay CSG rebates for any working days
it delays in complying with the notice timeframes. If the CSP entirely
fails to comply with the timeframes, the exemption will be taken
to never have existed.
In order for a provider to declare an exemption from the CSG in
relation to any service, it must be able to show that the delay
in attending to that service was the result of circumstances beyond
its control, or to having to relocate staff & equipment to deal
with the problem. This is consistent with section 22(1) of the CSG
Standard, which states:
A carriage service provider is exempt from complying with
a performance standard to the extent that non-compliance with
the standard is a result of circumstances, beyond the control
of the carriage service provider…
Consequently, even if a service is included in an affected number
range, the TIO is still able to investigate to determine whether
such a causal link exists.
If it can be shown that the delay in attending to a pre-existing
condition was due to circumstances beyond the provider's control,
or having to reallocate staff to deal with those circumstances,
the CSG would not apply, and no damages would be payable. However,
if the delay would have occurred irrespective of the MSD, i.e. the
delay was not due to factors beyond the provider’s control,
it is the TIO’s position that the CSG would apply.
The TIO can also investigate complaints where a customer disputes
the validity of an exemption based on extreme weather, or where
a provider has failed to comply with the notice provisions for exemptions.
In such cases, the TIO would seek to have the appropriate CSG damages
paid to the customer.
Last updated: 6 September 2007
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in-place services and the CSG
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