ACCC publishes data on take-up of broadband access services
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission today published information concerning the number and distribution of services supplied over Telstra's customer access network. The data is being released in conjunction with the joint report titled Communications Infrastructure and Services Availability in Australia 2008 published today by the Australian Communications and Media Authority and the ACCC.
The data is fundamental to a range of decisions that are before the ACCC, and today's publication is aimed at ensuring the data is available for interested parties' information and comment.
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The snapshots have been prepared from data that Telstra provided to the ACCC under a record keeping and reporting rule, the Telstra Customer Access Network Record Keeping Rule (Telstra CAN RKR).
Under the Telstra CAN RKR, Telstra reports the total number of ULLS, LSS and its own voice and digital subscriber line (DSL) services that are in operation as at the end of the calendar quarter. The data are disaggregated by individual provider on an exchange service area (ESA) basis.
Under a Disclosure Direction made by the ACCC on 14 August 2008, Telstra is required to provide a snapshot of these data marked for public release on a quarterly basis.
For the purposes of preparing the snapshot, the data are aggregated into geographic areas (ULLS bands).
The ULLS bands are as follows:
Band 1 ESAs are in central business districts
Band 2 ESAs are in metropolitan areas (more than 108.4 services in operation (SIOs) per square km)
Band 3 ESAs are in regional and rural areas (more than 6.54 SIOs per sq km)
Band 4 ESAs are in remote areas (less than 6.55 SIOs per sq km).
The ACCC has published on it website maps of the four ULLS bands to assist in interpretation of the data.
The ULLS is a service for access to unconditioned cable, usually a copper wire pair, between a telephone exchange and an end user's home or office. The ULLS essentially gives an access seeker the use of the copper pair without any dial tone or carriage service. This allows the access seeker to use its own equipment in an exchange to provide a range of services, including traditional voice services and high speed internet access, to the end-user.
The LSS is an access service that allows access to the higher frequency spectrum of a line (metallic pair) on which a PSTN voice service is being supplied. It typically allows two carriers to provide separate services over a line. Access to the higher frequency spectrum is generally used to supply broadband (DSL) services, while the PSTN voice service is supplied over the lower frequency spectrum.
The snapshots also include charts of access seeker presences at exchanges; this is calculated by identifying the number of access seekers who have taken up a ULLS and/or a LSS service at each exchange and grouping exchanges with the same number of access seekers together.
DSLAM site estimates use access seeker presence information; a DSLAM site is an exchange where Telstra has reported that an access seeker has taken up a ULLS and/or LSS service. This method of calculating DSLAM sites was identified in the ACCC Infrastructure Record-Keeping Rule 2007 Regulation Impact Statement, December 2007, Page 11, (publicly available at http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/835987) as an alternative to requiring all carriers to report on their own DSLAMs in order to reduce regulatory burden on industry. This method also increases the consistency, timeliness and accuracy of reporting.
The information is being published for the information of interested parties, as this type of information is likely to be relevant to a number of matters that could come before the ACCC for decision, such as applications for exemptions from regulation in geographic areas.
