BellSouth Telecommunications Service Priority (TSP) Service


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Service Description

The Telecommunications Service Priority (TSP) System provides a coding scheme for the priority provisioning and restoration of National Security and Emergency Preparedness (NS/EP) telecommunications services. NS/EP telecommunications services are those services critical to the maintenance of a state of readiness or the response to and management of any event or crisis which causes or could cause harm to the population, damage property, or threaten the security of the United States. TSP telecommunications include those services that support the following NSEP missions:

  • National Security Leadership
  • National Economic Posture and US Population Warning
  • Public Health, Safety, and Maintenance of Law and Order
  • Public Welfare and Maintenance of National Economic Posture

TSP service is available to Federal, State, local and foreign government users, as well as certain private sector organizations that have services that support an NS/EP function. Telecommunications carriers may also require priority treatment of services you own or lease - particularly services which are critical to maintain the integrity of the carrier's network.

TSP service users request TSP assignments from the Office of Priority Telecommunications (OPT) at the National Communications System (NCS). After approving a request, the OPT provides the user with a TSP Authorization Code. The user forwards the Authorization Code, via a service order, to their BellSouth representative or LENS. BellSouth then uses the TSP priority levels included in the Authorization Code to guide the sequence for responding to provisioning or restoration requirements.

The priority levels are E, 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Priority level "E" is assigned only to Emergency provisioning requests. Priority levels 1 through 5 are assigned to all other provisioning and restoration services. BellSouth uses the following sequence for the restoration or provisioning of TSP services:

  • Restore TSP services assigned restoration priority 1
  • Provision Emergency TSP services assigned provisioning priority "E"
  • Restore TSP services assigned restoration priority 2, 3, 4, or 5
  • Provision TSP services assigned provisioning priority 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5

Benefits

There are two major benefits to using the TSP System. First, service users can obtain TSP assignments for priority provisioning (i.e., installation) of new telecommunications services when it is necessary and justified. Emergency services are those new services so critical as to be required to be provisioned at the earliest possible time, without regard to the service user's cost of obtaining them. Emergency provisioning services must directly support or result from a specific NSEP function such as responding to a presidential, state or locally declared disaster or emergency.

Second, service users with TSP assignments can obtain priority restoration of existing services if those services experience an outage or become unusable. Under the rules of the TSP System, Telecommunications service vendors are both authorized and required to provision and restore those telecommunications services with TSP assignments before services without such assignments. The rules specify that when service vendors recognize that a TSP service is out of service, unusable, or they receive a trouble report, they will allocate available resources to restore the service as quickly as practical. This response is required regardless of the cause of the outage.

Whether responding to natural disaster, supporting civil or military crises, or maintaining emergency communications networks, the TSP system is the only authorized mechanism to receive priority provisioning and restoration of telecommunications service in the BellSouth region. To the extent that TSP is the only restoration scheme in BellSouth, BellSouth's E911trunk and data facilities are coded as TSP to ensure the appropriate level of attentiveness to the continuity E911 service.

The TSP coding scheme via the service order flow becomes a permanent indicator in the BellSouth Maintenance database. All BellSouth support centers (Work Management Centers, ACAC, and BRC) have been trained to recognize the TSP field in LMOS, WFA, TIRKS and LFACS. Any TSP circuit reported or detected to be out of service will be dispatched on a priority basis regardless of the nature of the outage (disaster or day to day operations).

Applications

Only telecommunications services that qualify as National Security Emergency Preparedness (NSEP) services are eligible for TSP assignments. For that reason, only a very small percentage of the nation's overall telecommunications services qualify for priority assignments. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) defines NSEP services as " those telecommunications services which are used to maintain a state of readiness or to respond to and manage any event or crisis (local, national or international), which causes or could cause injury or harm to the population, damage to or loss of property, or degrades or threatens the NSEP posture of the United States.

TSP service users are not limited to the federal government. State, local and foreign governments may have requirements that qualify as National Security Emergency Preparedness services. In addition, certain private industry telecommunications services may qualify as well. All telecommunications service users have equal access to the TSP System whether they are part of the federal government, a state or local government, a foreign government or a private entity. Participation in the TSP System by a service user is voluntary.

IXCs and Wireless Carriers might qualify to code what are considered carrier orderwire circuits. These are those facilities leased from BellSouth which are considered essential for the carrier to conduct business (i.e., critical backbone facilities or certain SS7 links) or facilities which are essential to carriers ability to restore services (i.e., data links between support systems).

Wireless carriers might also qualify to code the trunks (CAMA or Feature Group D) providing connectivity between the Mobile Switching Centers and the BellSouth E911 selective router as TSP for priority restoration in the case of failure. In addition, facilities used for interconnection with the BellSouth ALI database are also likely to qualify for priority coding.

In the case of a CLEC, the end user of the CLEC's service may use the facility in the conduct of a NSEP mission. In that case, the end user will request TSP authorization from the OPT. The end user would then pass that information to the CLEC. The CLEC would have the priority code assigned to the facility by designating so on the LENS request.

Restrictions

The assignment of TSP on a circuit is not left to the discretion of BellSouth or the requesting carrier. The Office of Priority Telecommunications at the National Communications System approves all requests for TSP.

For more information on the TSP System and to obtain a copy of the Service User or Service Vendor Handbooks for the TSP System, contact the Office of Priority Telecommunications.

Write To:
Manager, National Communications System
Attn: OPT
701 South Court House Road
Arlington, Virginia 22204-2198

Telephone:
(703) 607-4933
DSN: 327-4933

Fax:
(703) 607-4937
DSN: 327-4937

E-mail:
TSP@NCS.GOV

Internet:
http://tsp.ncs.gov

Availability & Pricing

TSP coding is available on any circuit with a unique and identifiable circuit ID. That includes any transport facility in the FCC, GSST, Private Line or Access Tariffs.

TSP priority can be applied to any tariffed BellSouth transmission service. The applicable rates can be found in the following tariffs:

Tariff Section
General Subscriber Service Tariff A13
Private Line Service Tariff B2
Access Service Tariff E13
FCC No. 4 Tariff 13

The general tariff format is:

TSP Priority Installation (PI) - Non-recurring Charge
Provisioning, on a priority basis, of a new TSP service authorized as so urgent that it must be provided earlier than the company's standard provisioning interval.

TSP Priority Restoration (PR)
Restoration, on a priority basis, of an existing TSP service for which any interruption would have serious adverse impact on the supported NSEP function.

  1. Level Implementation - Non-Recurring Charge
    The initial implementation of TSP priority restoration coding on a new or existing circuit.
  2. Level Change - Non-Recurring Charge
    The subsequent change of a TSP priority restoration code on an existing circuit. No level change charge applies for the removal of TSP on an existing circuit.
  3. Administration/Maintenance - Recurring Monthly Charge
    This charge applies for the TSP confirmation and reconciliation processes required by the Office of Priority Telecommunications. BellSouth confirms on a monthly basis any service order activities affecting TSP coded circuits and reconcile on an annual basis that the BellSouth databases accurately reflect assigned TSP circuits and codes.

Ordering & Implementation

The telecommunications service must first qualify to be an NSEP service. TSP qualification requests can be made via the Internet, fax or mail to the Office of Priority Telecommunications (OPT) at the NCS.

The requesting service user sends the TSP request to the OPT.

Once the request is received, the OPT will issue a TSP Authorization Code to the user for each circuit to be coded for priority restoration.

The service user will provide the TSP Authorization Code to BellSouth through normal service ordering procedures.