Newsletter July - August - September 2020
Covid 19 Emergency: overview
As in previous quarters, for the third quarter of 2020, the topic of this report, was characterized by the state of emergency due to the extraordinary health crisis that Italy had to face, with respect to the spread of the Covid-19 virus.
In this context, the SB activities supporting the Communications Authority continued in the scope of the request for collaboration from the Authority to the Supervisory Board in the communication of April 20, in particular, the monitoring of the gradual opening of more than 5 000 new cabinets to bring ultra-broadband connection to more than 1 400 municipalities in areas of the country not yet covered by an ultra-broadband network (those falling under the so-called “white areas” of the 2016 ultra-broadband notices).
The monitoring was based on an analysis that examined the delivery data provided by TIM on a bimonthly basis for an observation period that began on March 23, 2020 and ended on June 30, 2020. The analysis that was carried out by the SB showed that all the cabinets from the program were activated by June 1, 2020, and that the reduction of the notice period to 10 days was respected by TIM for 99.96% of the activated cabinets. Furthermore, with respect to the management of work orders, no elements were found that showed a difference in the treatment between TIM Retail clients and OAO clients.
On August 5, 2020, with Determination n. 10/2020, the Council approved the submission of a Report to AgCom according to article 18 of the Regulation (AS 01/20), regarding the implementation of measures for the management and upgrading of network infrastructures to deal with the SARS-CoV-2 health crisis. In particular, the Council highlighted the opportunity to maintain the reduction in the notice period to ten days for the availability of FTTC Cabinet lines.
Covid 19 Emergency: increased monitoring frequency for KPI 395/18/CONS
As part of the support to the Authority in the framework of the Covid-19 emergency defined in their request of April 20, 2020, the Supervisory Board completed the biweekly monitoring for KPI 395/18/CONS and the supply of the transport KITs and the related VULANs for the VULA and Bitstream NGA services.
With regard to KPI 395, the monitoring revealed deviations on certain delivery KPIs during the peak period of the Covid-19 emergency, the causes were identified and recovery actions were implemented that led to the resolution of the critical issues. In the period following the peak, in the month of June 2020, a TIM/OAO deviation was detected for an assurance indicator, on KPI 13 "Average time to resolve a deterioration" for the FTTC services, for which investigations are underway.
Regarding the activities concerning the verification of the correct calculation of KPI 395/18/CONS, on July 23, 2020, the first experimental verification was carried out for two KPIs (one for delivery and one for assurance) aimed at confirming the feasibility, the consistency and the effectiveness of the protocol as agreed with TIM. The test was successful. TIM provided to the SBO the clarifications that were requested for the algorithms calculated for certain indicators.
In the meantime, the activities continued for the definition of a new KPO system to apply to the KPIs ex 395/18/CONS. On August 28, 2020, Professor G. Pica, a professor at the Università della Svizzera Italiana, made available the results of the experimental application of the multivariate linear regression method for some KPI 395.
Covid-19 Emergency: KIT VULA/Bitstream activation monitoring
With regard to the supply of the transport KITs and the related VULANs, the activities carried out by the SB demonstrated that the VLANs processing were managed much more quickly by TIM compared to the SLAs. The KITs, on the other hand, required a much larger commitment with delivery times more comparable with the limits defined in the SLAs.
Netmap system performance evaluation
The analysis of the quality of the new NetMap database continued in accordance with the provisions of Determination n. 9/2019. The analyzed data in the monthly reports made available to the Authority did not show any critical issues both in terms of qualitative performance of the database and in terms of equal treatment TIM-OAO.
Process digitalization
Also in this quarter, the SB continued monitoring - on a monthly basis - the digitalization of provisioning processes, analyzing the indicators aimed at evaluating the performance of delivery services through the digital channel (the so-called Virtual Agent) with respect to the same processes managed by the traditional, or “human”, channel.
Monitoring trend of coverage parameters and NGA migration in the decommissioning process
With regard to the support to Agcom for the monitoring trend of coverage parameters and NGA migration in the decommissioning process, on September 24, 2020, a meeting was held between the Supervisory Office and TIM to acquire elements that are useful for defining the protocol for checking the residual coverage with FWA technology. In particular, the service level (30Mbit/s in down and 3 Mbit/s in up), the reference receivers (outdoor CPE), the observation and calculation base (active lines) were specified.
Within the scope of the SB support activities to Agcom in the implementation of Resolution n.396/18/CONS, on July 15, 2020 the Supervisory Office carried out an assessment to ensure the correct implementation of the measures established as a result of the technical roundtable referred to in resolution 396/18/CONS on the TTM WEB OLO system.
Technical Plan Monitoring
With respect to Undertakings numbers 5 and 6, during this quarter the SB continued the verification activities for the transmission of documents as required by the SB commitments. In particular, the verification of the publication of reports regarding the programs and quarterly results was ascertained.
Meetings between the SB and Agcom m and TIM
Regarding the dialogue between the Supervisory Board and the Communications Authority, it is noted that during this quarter numerous encounters continued between the Supervisory Board Office and the Agcom offices of the Network Division to share the status update for the monitoring activities connected to the Covid 19 health crisis.
Instead, for the meetings between the SB Council and TIM, it is noted that hearings were held on July 15, August 5, and September 16, 2020, these were useful moments for discussion and comparison on the themes connected to the management of the Covid-19 emergency period and on the transformation of policies for network access. In particular, during the September 16 meeting, TIM presented the project related to the upcoming creation of the FiberCop company to the Supervisory Board members.
FTTC network faults - Technical Roundtable
It is noted that a videoconference meeting was held, on July 27, 2020, of the Technical Roundtable composed of the SB - TIM - Wind Tre technical representatives regarding FTTC network faults. During the meeting, the methods of a detailed analysis to be implemented on the critical areas were defined (due to failures reported by WIND TRE).