Notice of withdrawal for REN Handover Points at exchanges that are not FAN Points of Interconnect
Today our main aggregation network is the Fibre Aggregation Network (FAN), built to support UFB services. In preparation for the impending shutdown of the Regional Ethernet Network (REN), the plan is to move all traffic to the FAN, which means that handover locations will need to align with UFB Point of Interconnect (POI) sites.
As part of this transition, REN handovers will need to be re-platformed to the FAN. For Handover Points on the REN that are at UFB POI sites, this just means re-platforming via a port change at the same location.
However, as REN Handover Points that are not at UFB POI sites are being withdrawn, the traffic currently handed over at those Handover Points will need to be migrated to a new Handover Point at a UFB POI site.
Notice of withdrawal of REN-only Handover Points
This is formal notice under the relevant contracts (the Standard Terms Determinations and any services which are commercial variants thereof, the CSA, the WCSA and the Reference Offer/2022 CSA) that we are withdrawing REN Handover Points in exchanges that are not FAN Points of Interconnect by 31 August 2024 (REN-only Handover Points).
Please refer to the REN to FAN Handover Remapping list for an overview of the REN-only Handover Points that are being withdrawn and their corresponding FAN POIs where replacement FAN handovers will be provided.
Impacted services
The services that are affected by this withdrawal (because they terminate at the affected Handover Points) are EUBA/UBA DSL/VDSL; HSNS Lite Copper and Fibre, eDMR, HSNS Premium and Baseband/BBIP; plus Tail Extension Services on any of these services (Impacted Services).
HSNS Premium currently terminates at these Handover Points but is already being withdrawn on a shorter timeline.
eDMR also terminates at these Handover Points but we will communicate separately how the changes impact this service, our approach and any options for service providers.
Change of Handover location for REN-only Handovers (Re-platforming at a different location)
REN Handover Points may be present in exchanges that are not FAN Points of Interconnect. This means we are unable to offer a FAN Handover Point at that same exchange location. You will need to tell us what you want to do:
- Either replace your handover with a new Handover Connection at our recommended FAN site; or
- Consolidate Connections to an existing Handover Connection at our recommended FAN site; or
- Utilise Tail Extension Service (TES) to terminate Connections at a FAN site that is not our recommended FAN POI.
In the case of option 1 and 2, Chorus will provide you with free A-step TES from the exchange with the withdrawn REN-only Handover to the nearest FAN POI which will be the new Handover Point. If you choose to leverage TES to hand over traffic to a different FAN POI than the one we have proposed (option 3), then standard TES charges will apply.
Your Chorus account team can help you work through options. We will be in touch in advance of the re-mapping to ensure that any temporary service outage during the migration is managed in a way which creates the least possible disruption and ensures efficient allocation of resources.
The REN to FAN Handover Remapping list details all existing REN Handover Point (aka First Data Switch) locations and their corresponding FAN POIs.
Re-platforming at the same location
Where you currently have a service (including TES) terminating to a Handover Point that is being re-platformed from REN to the FAN at the same location, you do not need to do anything. However, there will be a short outage as we swap from the REN port to the FAN port. We will be in touch in advance of these outage dates with a brownout period relevant to the Handover POI area to ensure efficient allocation of resources.
Charges
Where we are re-platforming your Handover Connection from REN to FAN at the same location, or where RSPs are required to migrate services from a REN-only Handover Point to an alternative Handover Point at the FAN POI that we specify, we will waive all applicable charges.
To ensure that RSPs are not charged for the additional backhaul distance to the UFB POI that we specify, we will update the TES step-matrix to include these new routes as zero-rated A-Steps. This will take effect for UBA TES, HSNS TES and BBIP TES as each Handover Point is withdrawn. The proposed updated TES matrices can be found below under resources.
Standard charges will apply for voluntary consolidation, where RSPs want traffic delivered to an alternative handover at a POI of their preference, or where additional/new services are ordered the same time.
Next steps
If you have any questions or wish to discuss your handover requirements, please contact your account team.