Opinion ID: 186018
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Billing Metrics

Text: 22 Z-Tel also argues the Commission acted arbitrarily and capriciously by not giving any weight to the recalculated billing metrics Verizon submitted as part of its August 17 submission. According to Z-Tel, they show Verizon made many more errors in billing CLECs than it made in billing its own customers. 23 In the Order the Commission noted both that the CLECs had challenged the soundness of certain of the billing metrics and that Verizon itself acknowledges some of the metrics' flaws. Order ¶ 41 n. 157. The Commission concluded by noting: 24 Until July ... the billing accuracy and timeliness metrics did not apply to Verizon's BOS BDT bills. Verizon generally does not rely on its wholesale billing performance metrics to establish its affirmative case. In these circumstances, we do not rely on the billing accuracy metrics in considering Verizon's section 271 showing. 25 Id. Z-Tel's complaint is that the Commission cannot ignore evidence unfavorable to an applicant merely because the applicant itself did not rely upon it; rather, Z-Tel claims, the Commission must consider all probative evidence properly put before it, regardless whether the applicant has relied upon it. 26 Z-Tel's point, which may well be correct as a general proposition, does not advance its cause here because the billing metrics in question were not, as calculated, indicative of the contemporaneous error rate. To be specific, the billing accuracy metrics, which are the metrics Z-Tel claims undermine Verizon's application, are calculated as fractions: 27 The numerator of the bill accuracy metrics [(BI-3)] is the total amount of dollars credited to CLECs as a result of billing errors in the reporting month, regardless of when the CLEC submitted the claim for the error or what month(s) the error occurred in. The denominator is the current charges billed to CLECs in the reporting month.... [T]his means that the credits reported in a month do not relate to the charges billed in that month.... 28 McLean/Wierzbicki/Webster Reply Decl. (Aug. 6, 2001) 24 ¶ 54. As Z-Tel itself as well as other commenters pointed out, the result of this arrangement is that the billing metrics won't capture failures for many months. Z-Tel Ex Parte (Aug. 17, 2001) at 4. And as became clear at oral argument, the numerator for a given month may contain credits issued for that month, for one or more prior months, or for no months, depending upon the vintage of the billing disputes Verizon and the CLECs happened to resolve that month. Because of this and other limitations, Z-Tel informed the Commission that Verizon's billing performance metrics produce no substantive information. Id. 29 Although Z-Tel later argued to the Commission that the recalculated billing metrics Verizon submitted on August 17 remedied some of the problems with those metrics — in particular, Verizon's placing CLEC billing errors in the wrong performance reports, Z-Tel Ex Parte (Sept. 6, 2001) at 2 n.1 — it did not claim that Verizon had solved the underlying structural problem with the metrics. The Commission did not go into great detail about its reason for not relying upon the billing metrics, but what it did say is both clear and sound: competitive LECs allege the billing metrics are inaccurate, Order ¶ 41 n. 157; Verizon itself acknowledges some of the metrics' flaws, id.; Verizon generally does not rely upon the metrics, id.; therefore neither would the Commission rely upon them. 30 In its reply brief to this court Z-Tel now claims that Verizon's recalculation of the metrics corrected their primary problem. It appears to us, however, that the structural problem with the metrics, namely the unpredictable but possibly significant lag between any error and its reflection in the billing metrics, is at least as serious. Certainly Z-Tel did not indicate in its comments to the Commission that this was a lesser problem. Under these circumstances, we do not fault the Commission for declining to rely upon data that the parties agreed had significant problems.