|
..Case Studies
|
Qwest
During 2001 and 2002, Liberty
conducted a Performance Measures Audit for the Regional Oversight
Committee (ROC), which consists of commissioners, commission
staff, and stakeholders with responsibility for or substantial
interests in the local exchange operations of US WEST (now Qwest)
across the 14-state region in which this local exchange carrier
provides such service. Thirteen of those 14 state commissions
participated in this audit. The Arizona Commission conducted a
separate audit of performance measures; however it later asked
Liberty to include its state in subsequent Qwest data reconciliation
work.
Liberty’s Performance Measures Audit for the ROC was the country’s
most extensive OSS testing ever undertaken in the context of Section
271 proceedings to approve the RBOC’s entry into the interLATA
market in states where it provides local service. That testing
process included what is still the country’s most comprehensive
examination of the accuracy of wholesale performance measuring and
reporting.
The Qwest audit specifically
addressed a series of more than 50 performance measures (which, with
sub-measures, impose several hundred quantified performance
standards) by which Qwest’s performance for CLECs will be measured.
These measures, among the country’s most detailed and quantitative,
govern nearly every measurable aspect of Qwest’s performance.
Measures included in the audit covered the areas of electronic
gateway availability, pre-ordering, ordering and provisioning,
maintenance and repair, billing, database updates (including E911),
directory assistance, network performance, and collocation.
Liberty’ audit included the
three following principal audit task areas:
-
Examining the systems,
processes, and procedures by which Qwest measures and records
performance results;
-
Conducting detailed tracking
of the data Qwest uses to measure performance (to verify accuracy,
completeness, and use in actual measurements of performance
results);
-
Replicating Qwest’s
calculations of performance results to verify their accuracy and
completeness.
As part
of its continuing work after the audit, Liberty conducted extensive
data reconciliation work using data provided by CLECs operating in
the Qwest region. This data reconciliation effort was geared to
determining whether there were reasonable assurances that the
performance as measured and reported by Qwest was equivalent to the
performance that Qwest actually delivered.
|
