Wholesale: Products & Services

Billing Information - Ensemble

Description

Ensemble is one of the systems CenturyLink™ uses to bill various products and services, which are not billable via any other CenturyLink billing system.

CenturyLink will bill you for products and services you purchase from CenturyLink. The system used to format your bill depends on the type of output requested during the Getting Started process and the products and/or services purchased. CRIS is one of the systems CenturyLink uses to bill various charges.

If you are a new CLEC and are ready to do business with CenturyLink, view Getting Started as a Facility-Based CLEC or Getting Started as a Reseller. If you are an existing CLEC wishing to amend your Interconnection Agreement or your New Customer Questionnaire, you can find additional information in the Interconnection Agreement.

Ensemble is one of the CenturyLink billing systems.

Some of the charges billed by Ensemble are:

• Basic Business Services
• Basic Residence Services
• Centrex
• Integrated Services Digital Network-Primary Rate Interface (ISDN-PRI)
• Interim Number Portability (INP)
• IntraLATA Toll
• Local Number Portability (LNP)
• Loops
• Private Line (Digital Switched Services (DSS), Digital Service Level 1 (DS1), Digital Service Level 3 (DS3))
• Commercial local exchange services products, e.g. CenturyLink™ Local Services Platform (CLSP™)

Availability

CenturyLink CRIS billing is offered in CenturyLink QC.

Bill Formats

The bill format media is specified on the CenturyLink New Customer Questionnaire. If you wish to change your bill format media after initial establishment, refer to Getting Started to update your media choice and forward it to the person listed on the questionnaire.

Your Ensemble bill can be received in the following media in all CenturyLink regions:

• Paper - The CenturyLink Official Bill of Record, unless one of the following electronic media is selected as the CenturyLink Official Bill of Record.
• EDI
• Control Center: You can sign up to use Lumen Control Center to view and download your bill online at . If you want to change from paper to paperless, or stop receiving your paper bill in the mail, you can do that via Control Center.

Pricing

Rates

Cost Dockets are state-mandated rates, determined by each state Public Utilities Commission (PUC) or state regulatory agencies. You will be notified of Cost Docket rate changes when the rates in a specific Interconnection Agreement are updated. You can request a copy of the updated Interconnection Agreement from your CenturyLink Service Manager. If, after the billing systems have been updated with new rates, you would like to request USOC, Class of Service and Rates for the CRIS billed products affected by the Cost Docket, send a written request to your Service Manager. You will be notified by a second notification at least 15 days prior to the implementation of the new rates in the CenturyLink billing system.

Features/Benefits

Features	Benefits
Summary Billing	Allows you to manage your financials at the Summary Billing Level

Implementation

Summary Billing Account Number (BAN) Establishment

A requirement prior to any Local Service Request (LSR) activity is the establishment of the Summary Billing Account Number (BAN). The Summary BAN will be established 30 to 45 days after the New Customer Questionnaire is completed, any required deposits paid. Once the BAN is established and a CenturyLink Billing Service Delivery Coordinator (SDC) is assigned to your account, you will be notified of the Ensemble Summary BAN number and the LSR activity can begin.

Overview of Ensemble Billing

When you submit a LSR, CenturyLink will complete the requested work and send the service order(s) information to the Ensemble billing system. You will receive a daily report of completed orders.

Once the Ensemble billing system receives the completed service order(s), it does the following:

• Rates each Universal Service Order Code (USOC) on the order(s), based on tariff information and/or information from your Interconnection Agreement
• Updates the accounts to ensure all information is correct including end-user toll usage
• Updates the CenturyLink Customer Service Record (CSR) when the account is processed for billing
  • Ensemble will update a CenturyLink CSR within three to five business days. Exception would be if the service order should error. Errors are manually worked and once the error has been fixed, then the service order will take the three to five business days to post.
  • The CSR contains the Working Telephone Number (WTN) or Product ID associated with the service that was installed. This includes all bill, listing, service and/or feature information, per line, for each account. CSRs can be requested in EASE VFO GUI or by email to CSIE.
    • When pulling CSR data using the EASE VFO VCSI (Virtual Customer Service Information) the data is shown in USOC format.
    • When pulling the CSR billing data using the billing view option from EASE VFO (text type E), the data is shown using the price plans/feature codes that are billed in Ensemble.
  • All of the customer bills are distributed using Price Plan/Feature Codes.

You are billed out of the Ensemble billing system on a Summary BAN. Ensemble provides one bill and payment document per month for all of the services on the account, within the same state (mixed Numbering Plan Areas (NPAs) acceptable). The BAN contains Product IDs for each end-user service and depicts detailed charges associated with each Product ID. Taxes are shown on the bill at the account level and not the individual Product ID.

If you have more than 6000 end-users in one state, CenturyLink may establish a new Summary BAN. Your Service Delivery Coordinator (SDC) will notify you a minimum of three business days prior to the new Summary BAN effective date. Once a new Summary BAN account number has been established, any new end-user accounts should not be assigned to an old Summary BAN. Your CenturyLink Billing SDC will advise you when you have reached the limit and will advise you of the new Summary BAN. The new Summary account number will be assigned for new services and changes as the order flows into CenturyLink via EASE.

Ensemble identifies, formats, rates, and stores all billable call detail records until the time for the calls to be billed on the end-users Sub Account. This only applies as long as CenturyLink is the underlying toll provider for all toll records of usage by your end-users.

Ensemble identifies, formats, rates, and stores all billable call detail records until the time for the calls to be billed on the end-users Sub Account. This only applies as long as CenturyLink is the underlying toll provider for all toll records of usage by your end-users.

Following usage processing, CRIS produces a Daily Usage File (DUF). If you have purchased Centrex Plus products, you can elect to receive a Station Message Detail Recording (SMDR) file.

CenturyLink will establish separate Summary BANs per state, for the following product groupings:

• Resale (See Note below)
• Unbundled Network Elements (UNE)
• Number Portability
• Public Access Line (PAL)
• Shared Tenant
• Commercial local exchange services products

NOTE: For the states of Oregon and Washington, the Resale Summary Bills will be separated by CenturyLink Business accounts and Residence accounts.

To request paper format CSR's refer to the Pre-Ordering Overview.
To request ASCII format CSR's contact your CenturyLink Service Manager.

The following table provides some basic examples of commonly found bill charges.

Charge	Basic Description
Fractional	Determining the daily rate in all three regions: When service does not span an entire bill period (e.g., new connect or disconnect), the monthly recurring charge is prorated to bill or credit from the date the service was installed or disconnected. The pro-ration calculation is: rate per monthly recurring charge divided by 30 days equals the daily rate. Determining the actual number of days billed: Calculating the number of days to bill (fractionals) in the Eastern and Western Regions use the actual calendar days. For example, assume using October 29th as a new service connect with a bill date of November 2nd. The billing start date would be October 30th. Counting the actual days, would be October 30th, October 31st and November 1st. The Eastern and Western Regions would bill three days. Calculating the number of days to bill (fractionals) in the Central Region always assumes a 30 day month. Using the same October 29th new service connect with the same November 2nd bill date, the billing start date would also be October 30th. Based on a 30 day month the days to bill would be October 30th and November 1st. The Central Region would bill 2 days.
Deposit Interest Credits	Credit assessed on money received in error Credit assessed on money received to secure service (deposit) Such credits are based on your Interconnection Agreement or tariff language
Late Payment Charges	Charge assessed when payment for a bill is not received in a specified time frame Such charges are based on your Interconnection Agreement or tariff language
Minimum Billing Period	The minimum period for which services are provided and for which rates and charges are applicable. When a service is discontinued prior to the expiration of the minimum period, charges are applicable, whether the service is used or not Minimum Billing Periods may not apply to all types of services
Non Recurring	A charge for specific work activity (e.g. an installation charge) Rates are either contained in your Interconnection Agreement or tariffed.
Out of Service Credits/Adjustments	Credits assessed when a circuit or service is not working. Such credits can vary from product to product and may not apply in some instances based on your Interconnection Agreement or tariff language
Primary Interexchange Carrier (PIC)/Local Primary Interexchange Carrier (LPIC) Change Charge	Charge assessed to change pre-selected InterExchange Carrier (IXC) or local Toll Provider
Recurring	Flat rated monthly charges that apply to each bill period or fraction thereof Rates are either in your Interconnection Agreement or tariffed. For billing purposes, each bill period is based on 30 days
Subscriber Line Charge/Presubscribed Interexchange Carrier Charge (PICC)	Charge assessed to your end-user for access to long distance.
Surcharges	Various surcharges accessed by a governing body may be added to the bill, including but not limited to: 911, Telephone Relay System (TRS), and LNP Cost Recovery
Taxes	Charges assessed by a governing body on services or products provided. Refer to Taxes and Tax Exemptions for more information.
Testing Charges	Charges applied to provide a CenturyLink technician to perform network testing (refer to specific product to determine if charges apply)
Usage Charges	Charges can be applied on a per minute of use, a per call, or per query basis. Usage Charges can include the following: IntraLATA Toll (Local Access and Transport Area) Local Measured Service Pay Per Use items (i.e., 3 Way Calling, Last Call Return, 976 Calls)

Toll Guide Information

To ensure correct billing, CenturyLink uses a Toll Guide record. This record resides within CRIS (ENSEMBLE) and is able to identify and ensure that once any type of usage has been processed through CRIS (ENEMBLE), it is correctly stored and passed to the correct billing number. A Toll Guide is created for each main line and each additional line. Toll Guides may change at times, such as when service orders are issued that add, change, or delete any of the following:

• Telephone number
• Account number
• Calling plan
• The end-user responsible for the account

A Toll Guide is a telephone number and date-based record which reads the billing number and the date of the usage record to identify which account should be billed that usage. This also ensures that accounts, which have changes, are billed for the correct usage. The guide is not time sensitive, only date sensitive.

When a new account is established, the completion date on the service order will be the Toll Guide established date. When a service order has been issued to establish service on a specific date, any toll from that date forward will be guided to that account until a change or disconnect occurs. For example, a new service order completion date is 6-1-01, the account and guide will establish on the same date, 6-1-01, unless the new account is associated with a disconnect on the same day. In this case, the new guide will establish on the next date, 6-2-01.

When a CLEC responsible for a service is changing, the new account information and Toll Guide establish date will be the completion date plus one-day. This allows the system to final out the old account and Toll Guide effective with the service order date. The new account is established along with the guide the following day. For example, if a change of responsibility service order is completed on 6-1-01 the new account information would be established 6-2-01. This allows any usage created for the old account on 6-1-01 to be properly guided and billed to the old account. This applies to all retail and wholesale migration scenarios including the following types of account migrations:

• CLEC to CLEC
• Retail to commercial local exchange services products
• Retail to Resale
• Resale to commercial local exchange services products
• Resale to Retail
• Commercial local exchange services products to Resale
• Commercial local exchange services products to Retail

Disputes

General dispute process activities are described in the Billing Information - Dispute Process.

Rate Validation

CenturyLink has a process for validation of rates. When CenturyLink determines a billed rate correction is necessary, you will be notified by your CenturyLink Billing SDC at least 10-days prior to the correction being made. The 10-day window will begin when the CenturyLink Billing SDC sends a detailed Rate Change Notification form to you. The Rate Change Notification form will include information explaining the old and new rates, effective date of the correction, etc.

There are three different Rate Correction Notifications Forms that may be received depending on the product/service that is being corrected. The forms are as follows:

Rate Validation

CenturyLink has a process for validation of rates. When CenturyLink determines a billed rate correction is necessary, you will be notified by your CenturyLink Billing SDC at least 10-days prior to the correction being made. The 10-day window will begin when the CenturyLink Billing SDC sends a detailed Rate Change Notification form to you. The Rate Change Notification form will include information explaining the old and new rates, effective date of the correction, etc.

There are three different Rate Correction Notifications Forms that may be received depending on the product/service that is being corrected. The forms are as follows:

• CLEC Identification (ZCID) Rate Notification Form
• ZCID Rate Notification Form Guide
• Resale Correction Notification Form
• Resale Correction Notification Form Guide
• Usage Rate Correction Notification Form
• Usage Rate Correction Notification Form Guide

You may contact your CenturyLink Billing SDC regarding any questions you have regarding the Rate Validation process and/or Rate Change Notification form.

Bill Resend

There may be times when you wish to have a copy of a bill resent to you. To do this, you should contact your CenturyLink Billing SDC.

Contacts

Billing Questions, Disputes and Resends

• Assigned CenturyLink Billing SDC (Refer to the telephone number printed on your bill). If you are not sure whom to contact, you should call your assigned CenturyLink Service Manager.

Bill Media Technical Questions (Once Established)

• Contact your CenturyLink Service Manager

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. What information is NOT included when the bill is produced via EDI?


• OCR Return Document
• Page numbers
• Subtotals
• Major headings
• Logo symbols or carrier names
• Disclaimers, advertising narratives, informational legends
• Line numbers for toll detail
• Anything printed on the back of the bill

2. Can a dispute be issued verbally?

• No, all billing disputes must be submitted in writing.

Last Update: , 2024

Last Reviewed: , 2024