[VoiceOps] Direct CLEC interconnect - taking the plunge

[Scott Berkman]

Agreed on Mary Lou, she knows her stuff and can help navigate the waters
especially when it comes to ordering.

Some questions you may want to ask yourself:

Why make the step?  Are there features or capabilities you are missing, or
just a lack of control you want to address?  Does this make business sense
after adding up all the different recurring and start-up costs?

Do you have the right geographical concentration for this to make sense
(from the OP sounds like you might).

Do you and/or your staff have SS7 knowledge and equipment that can handle it
already?  Neither of these are particularly cheap.

Do you have an understanding of the local PUC's working rules and what it
will take to get a CLEC license?  Is this even possible in your specific
situation (some PUCs are very tight on issuing new licenses)?

Do you have a good telecom Attorney that can help you interpret and
negotiate your ICA with the iLEC?  Do you know who else is in the market to
compare their ICA?

Do you understand the local LEC infrastructure including how many LATAs,
Tandems, RC, and different LECs you may need to interconnect to?  Is there
more than one iLEC covering the areas you wish to serve?

Are you planning for Tandem trunking or do you have a reason to build out
End-office trunks?  What are your capacity needs?

Do you have a staff to handle LNP, 911, and other "provisioning" tasks?  How
about systems to track it all?  The FCC now has turnaround requirements on
simple ports as low as one day you'll need to be able to meet.

What are you not going to handle on your own?  TF RESPORG is one good
example that smaller CLECs don't jump right into.  You'll still need other
carriers for LD and International as well.

Have you taken into account supplementary services like e911 (you'll need a
listing provider like Intrado if you plan to have local trunks, or a nomadic
solution like Bandwidth/Dash/iNetwork and 911-enable), OSDA, CNAM and LNP
dipping?

Some other items you'll want to research include the costs and processes for
getting the other details setup, like switch CLLIs, point codes, OCNs, TN
block assignments...

Hope that helps,

-Scott

-----Original Message-----
From: voiceops-bounces at voiceops.org [mailto:voiceops-bounces at voiceops.org]
On Behalf Of Ryan Finnesey
Sent: Wednesday, October 17, 2012 8:19 PM
To: Anthony Orlando
Cc: VoiceOps
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Direct CLEC interconnect - taking the plunge

Backup Telecom is great.  

Sent from my iPad

On Oct 17, 2012, at 8:14 PM, "Anthony Orlando" <avorlando at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Backup Telecom would be my first choice. Mary Lou Carey. She's on this
board. 
> 
> On Oct 17, 2012, at 18:39, Jay Hennigan <jay at west.net> wrote:
> 
>> We are a regional hosted VoIP provider in California.  We started as an
>> ISP and moved into becoming a CLEC offering VOIP.  As is probably the
>> case with most, we started buying DIDs from wholesale carriers as SIP
>> trunks.  The majority of our customers are within a single LATA with a
>> large minority in an adjoining one.
>> 
>> We are investigating the feasibility of direct interconnect with the
>> RBOC/ILEC via SS7.
>> 
>> I'm interested in pointers/gotchas as well as recommendations of a
>> consultant to help us navigate the maze, both from a political and
>> technical standpoint.  Suggestions as what not to do or who not to hire
>> are also welcome.
>> 
>> Please feel free to respond on-list or off as you feel appropriate.
>> -- 
>> _______________________________________________
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> 
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> 


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