June 29, 2012

Commitments for Funding Years 2012 and 2011

Funding Year 2012. USAC will release FY2012 Wave 1 Funding Commitment Decision Letters (FCDLs) July 10. This wave includes over $646 million in commitments for approved Priority 1 (Telecommunications Services and Internet Access) requests at all discount levels.

Congratulations to the first applicants that filed online and certified an FCC Form 471 for FY2012 – including their Item 21 attachments – online. All of them will receive commitments in the first FY2012 wave:

• First individual school: PIMERIA ALTA ACADEMY, Nogales, Arizona
• First school district: WEST POINT PUBLIC SCHOOLS, West Point, Virginia
• First library: MONITEAU COUNTY/PRICE JAMES LIBRARY, Tipton, Missouri
• First consortium: CLARE-GLADWIN RESD, Clare, Michigan

Funding Year 2011. USAC will release FY2011 Wave 51 FCDLs July 5. This wave includes commitments for approved Priority 2 (Internal Connections and Basic Maintenance) requests at 89% and above and denials at 80% and below. As of June 29, FY2011 commitments total just under $2.25 billion.

NOTE: Wave 50 also included Priority 2 commitments at 89%. The archived version of last week's SL News Brief has been corrected.

On the day the FCDLs are mailed, you can check to see if you have a commitment by using USAC's Automated Search of Commitments tool.

Fall 2012 Applicant Training Sessions

The eight applicant training sessions scheduled for fall 2012 are filling up. We have started waiting lists for Washington DC, Los Angeles, and Dallas; the other sessions still have space available. To register with USAC for the training or to make a room reservation at a conference hotel, refer to the Trainings and Outreach page on the USAC website.

Registrations are on a first-come, first-served basis. Please register only for the session that you want to attend. You can email USAC Training with questions or to cancel your registration if your plans change. 

Using the DRT

The Data Retrieval Tool (DRT) is a search tool that can provide a great deal of information about your progress through the application review, funding, and invoicing processes in the E-rate program. The search results from this tool are always organized by Funding Request Number (FRN), which is the identification number automatically assigned to each FCC Form 471 Block 5 funding request.

Funding requests are specific to a category of service (Telecommunications Services, Internet Access, Internal Connections, and Basic Maintenance) and to a Service Provider Identification Number (SPIN).

To view or download information from this tool, go to the DRT and follow the instructions below:

First, you must choose a funding year and at least one of the following:

• State
• Billed Entity Number (BEN)
• Service Provider Identification Number (SPIN)

You can then limit your search if you wish by specifying some optional criteria:

• FRN Service Type – The default is "all" so you must uncheck the boxes next to those you don’t want.
• Type of 471 Application - The default is "all" so you much uncheck the boxes next to those you don’t want.
• 471 Application Number
• Wave Number – Wave numbers consist of three alphanumeric characters. For example, you would enter "004" for Wave 4 or "96B" for Wave 96B.
• Appeal Wave Number – Appeal wave numbers consist of three alphanumeric characters starting with "A" or "B." For example, you would enter "A04" for Appeal Wave 4.

Finally, choose the format for your search results. Your choices are:

• Excel
• Tab-delimited text
• XML

You can then select either a Standard Report or choose specific fields of information ("data points") that meet the criteria you specified.

Standard Report

The Standard Report will return the following pre-chosen data points for the criteria you specified:

1. Form 471 Application Number
2. FRN
3. BEN
4. State
5. SPIN
6. Service Start Date reported on the FCC Form 486 ("486 SSD") – This field will be blank if an FCC Form 486 has not yet been certified and successfully processed.
7. Funding Year
8. Original requested amount for the FRN – This field will show the amount featured on the original FCC Form 471 (without RAL corrections).
9. Committed amount for the FRN – This field will be blank if USAC has not yet issued a commitment decision, and this amount can change if the committed amount on the FRN changes (see below).
10. Total authorized disbursement for the FRN – This field contains the total amount authorized on all invoices for this FRN. It will be blank if USAC has not yet successfully processed a disbursement (see below).

Select Data Points

If you check this box, you can then select the data points you want in your data file. The 471 Application Number and the FRN will always appear in the search results. You can either:

• Check the box next to "Select All Data Points" for a complete list or
• Check the box next to each data point you want. You can find a list of field names and descriptions at the end of the DRT Instructions.

When you have chosen your data points, scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the "Build Data File!" button. You can open the resulting file or save a copy to your local computer.

Notes on Data Points

1. You can search for original data points (data that appeared on the originally filed FCC Form 471) and/or committed data points (data that appeared on or after USAC issued a funding commitment decision) under Section E. Discount Funding Request Data. Check the box in the "O*" column for each original data point and the box in the "C*" column for each committed data point.
2. If a Funding Commitment Decision Letter (FCDL) has not been issued for an FRN, Commitment Status, Total Amount Committed, Commitment Remarks and Date of FCDL will be blank. Also, data points chosen from the "O*" column of the Discount Funding Request Data points will feature data from the original FCC Form 471 (without any RAL corrections) and data points chosen from the "C*" column will be blank.
3. If an FCDL has been issued for an FRN, data will appear for FRNs that have been committed or denied, but data for FRNs with a Pending status will not appear. Also, committed data will reflect the current net status (i.e., the data will reflect all changes subsequent to the FCDL, such as changes due to appeal decisions, FCC Form 486 and FCC Form 500 adjustments, Commitment Adjustments, etc.). In general, commitment data will appear one day after the date of the FCDL or other decision issued by USAC.
4. If USAC has not successfully processed an FCC Form 486, the 486 SSD field will be blank. Note that service providers often check this field for a date to determine if they are willing to start discounted billing.
5. The DRT includes only non-canceled certified applications that meet the window filing requirements for the selected funding year.
6. The Total Authorized Disbursement is the total of all disbursements made for that FRN. Individual invoice amounts do not appear in this tool. Note that it is possible that USAC has authorized a disbursement, but that disbursement has not yet been made.
7. If the Total Authorized Disbursement is greater than the Total Amount Committed for a specific FRN, this indicates that USAC reduced the funding commitment after it had authorized an amount for disbursement. If funds were disbursed in excess of the adjusted commitment for that FRN, USAC will seek recovery of those funds.

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