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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