Telecom Trends

Once again, the CRTC has decided to give an ILEC a "get out of jail free" card for a couple cable cuts that caused an extraordinary hit on their quality of service indicators. In this instance, the CRTC ruled that Sasktel was not responsible for two fibre cuts caused by trucks hitting aerial cables.

On first blush, I was surprised with the decision. I figured that the cables were too low for the truck traffic to get through - in which case, it would be hard to understand how the CRTC concluded that the

failure to meet the competitor Q of S standard was caused in that month by events beyond the reasonable control of the ILEC.

The write-up in the decision didn't give enough information. However, by going back to the original application, you can see that Sasktel was able to confirm that their cables were at the proper height - at least 15 feet off the ground.

In one case, the fibre was cut by a truck that forgot to lower its boom before exiting the storage yard. In the other case, the city failed to notify Sasktel that there were going to be oversized vehicles passing under an aerial cable.

As a result, TELUS was not entitled compensation from Sasktel for the service degradation.

Should carriers litigate against parties for their negligence in cutting fibre routes?

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CRTC, TELUS, Sasktel