March 17, 2017

Commitments for Funding Year 2016

Funding Year 2016. USAC is scheduled to release Funding Year (FY) 2016 Wave 39 Funding Commitment Decision Letters (FCDLs) on March 23. This wave includes commitments for approved applications for all service types and at all discount levels. As of March 17, FY2016 commitments total over $2.36 billion.

On the date the FCDLs are issued, you can access your FCDL notification from the Notifications section of your landing page in the E-rate Productivity Center (EPC).

How to Copy an FRN

When completing the FCC Form 471, you can often save time by copying a Funding Request Number (FRN) from the same or another FCC Form 471. The form must exist in EPC – so the FRN to be copied must have been created for FY2016 or FY2017 – but the form does not have to be certified, as long as all of the information for the FRN you want to copy has been completed.

To copy an FRN from the same or another FCC Form 471, follow these steps:

• Start your new FCC Form 471 in EPC. Provide the required data in the Basic Information and Entity Information sections of the form.
• When you reach the Funding Requests section, click the green Add FRN button.
• Create a nickname and answer the question, "Is this Funding Request a continuation of an FRN from a previous funding year?"
• Click the green Copy FRN button.
• To locate the FRN, you must search for either your FCC Form 471 application number or the FRN. If you do not have your form number or FRN, you can right-click the FCC Forms link on the left-hand menu, choose "Open Link in New Tab," and then perform a search to locate your form.
• After you identify the form or the FRN, you will then see a list of the FRN(s) you can copy. Check the box next to the FRN you want to copy and click the green Continue button.
• The system will then copy the FRN you chose. You must click the Refresh button to view the copied FRN in your current form.
• Review the copied FRN and make any necessary updates. Note that some information cannot be edited. Fields you can edit include:
  • Nickname
  • Service type, but only if you delete all associated FRN line items
  • Contract, if you associated a contract with the original FRN
  • Competitive bidding information, if you identified the original FRN as tariffed or month-to-month (e.g., number of bids received, establishing FCC Form 470 number, service provider, pricing confidentiality).

Keep in mind that the Copy FRN function is probably most useful for those applicants with a large number of FRN line items that are the same or very similar to those from another FCC Form 471. For applicants with only a few FRNs or FRN line items, it is probably easier to enter them manually.

QDRs To Be Issued for Fourth Quarter 2016

At the end of each quarter, USAC issues a Quarterly Disbursement Report (QDR) to each billed entity if any invoicing activity occurred during that quarter. The QDR includes every FCC Form 472 (BEAR Form) and FCC Form 474 (SPI Form) for all funding years that were submitted to USAC and processed during that quarter for that billed entity.

QDRs did not run for the fourth quarter of last year (October 1 – December 31, 2016). We have now run these reports, and they will be mailed next week. The date of this QDR cover letter will appear as December 31, 2016. This is because the system automatically assigns the day after the last payment file for that quarter as the date of the report, not the date that the report is produced.

We apologize for any inconvenience, and we will make sure that this quarter's report (for the period January 1 – March 31, 2017) is properly generated at the end of this month.

Update on New Fields in FCC Form 471 Download Tool

The FCC Form 471 Download Tool allows users to download detailed information from FCC Forms 471 for a particular funding year and state. You can also specify the ORIGINAL version of the form as submitted by the applicant or the CURRENT version that reflects all commitment and post-commitment modifications.

Your search results contain the following seven tabs in a single workbook:

• Basic Information
• Consultants
• Discount Calculations
• FRN
• FRN Line Items
• Recipients of Service
• Connectivity Information

We have added the following eight fields that have been missing from the search results:

• Basic Information tab

• Consultants tab

• FRN tab

Special Note Regarding Program Integrity Assurance (PIA) and Audit-related Activity

During a consortium's special compliance review, audit, payment quality assurance (PQA) assessment or other program integrity effort, USAC will not hold the consortium financially responsible for any finding that is based on incorrect data entered by a school or library.

We will also include this updated language in the Appeals & Audits section of the USAC website.