{"id":29821,"date":"2019-03-05T12:32:57","date_gmt":"2019-03-05T12:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/e-ratepaorg.local\/?p=29821"},"modified":"2019-03-12T12:34:11","modified_gmt":"2019-03-12T12:34:11","slug":"3-weeks-remain-to-file-471s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29821","title":{"rendered":"3 Weeks Remain to File 471s"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>March 5, 2019<\/p>\n<p>~ Deadline is Wednesday, March 27 ~<\/p>\n<p>~ 372 PA entities have filed! ~<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019re headed into the home stretch of the FY 2019 E-rate filing window and for those who have not yet filed, I wanted to take a moment and recap the steps and provide links to the previous messages that contain a wealth of information\/helpful filing guides.\u00a0 <strong>Important<\/strong>:\u00a0 You must file a Form 471 each year to request E-rate funding, even if you\u2019re in a multi-year contract.\u00a0 There is no such thing as a multi-year E-rate funding commitment.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Form 470 Competitive Bidding<\/strong>\u2013 For applicants that need to sign new contracts for FY 2019, the deadline to file 470\u2019s was February 27.\u00a0 If you missed this deadline, please contact me <em>immediately<\/em>.\u00a0 The absolute deadline to post PEPPM mini-bids for Category 2 equipment is March 13.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Bid Evaluation<\/strong>\u2013 After the Form 470 has been posted for 28 days, applicants may conduct their bid evaluations to determine the lowest responsible bidder.\u00a0 Applicants are not required to consider spam bids or proposals that come in after the 28<sup>th<\/sup> day.\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28851\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28851<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Negotiate Vendor Contracts<\/strong>\u2013 Applicants are encouraged to review carefully the contracts vendors are proposing and to request language be inserted that meets YOUR needs.\u00a0 Examples:\u00a0 specific # of contract extensions, discounted billing requirement, ability to add sites to network, E-rate contingencies, guaranteed network delivery date and penalties for not meeting that date, etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Board Approvals<\/strong>\u2013 If required by your local policies, applicants must obtain board approvals prior to signing the vendor contract.\u00a0 Libraries and non-public schools typically don\u2019t have this requirement, but public schools often do.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Sign Contracts <\/strong><strong>\u2013 <\/strong>E-rate requires that new contracts be signed by the applicant prior to filing the Form 471; the vendor signature can be obtained at any time (not required before E-rate filing).\u00a0 The only situations where a contract is not required is where Category 1 services are being purchased on a month-to-month (MTM) basis (in which case a FY 2019 Form 470 must have been posted).\u00a0 Also, if you\u2019re extending an existing contract, be sure to have something in writing (a formal extension or an e-mail to the vendor) as this will be requested during your PIA review.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Create Contract Records in EPC <\/strong>\u2013 Create a Contract Record in EPC for each new contract, prior to starting the Form 471. \u00a0Applicants with existing multi-year contracts or contract extensions are not required to create a new Contract Record; they will simply cite the original Contract Record when creating the Form 471 funding request. \u00a0General Contract Record Guide:\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28951\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28951<\/a>. \u00a0PEPPM Contract Record Guide:\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28991\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=28991<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>File the Form 471 <\/strong>\u2013 Category 1 and Category 2 requests must be filed on separate Form 471s, and you may file multiple forms for each category. \u00a0<em>Two hints<\/em>: Category 1:\u00a0 For WANs, list the unit cost for each circuit and then the # of circuits. \u00a0Category 2:\u00a0 If you have more than a few components, or if equipment is going to more than 1 school, create and use a Bulk Upload Template instead of filing multiple FRN Line Items and then doing the building-by-building cost breakdowns.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Category 1 Filing Guide<\/strong>:\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29151\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29151<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Category 2 Filing Guide<\/strong>:\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29321\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29321<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Calculating Category 2 Budgets:<\/strong>\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29681\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29681<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Category 2 Bulk Upload Guide:<\/strong>\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29361\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29361<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Modifying\/Canceling Form 471s<\/strong>: <a href=\"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29751\">https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=29751<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>PIA Review<\/strong>\u2013 After the Form 471 is filed, your application will be reviewed by USAC\u2019s PIA Team to ensure your discounts are valid, you\u2019re requesting eligible equipment\/services, you\u2019ve complied with the competitively bidding process, and you haven\u2019t requested more than your remaining Category 2 budgets.\u00a0 If PIA has questions, they will send you an e-mail with a link to the PIA Inquiry Module in EPC where the applicant will find the specific PIA questions.\u00a0 It is not uncommon for applicants to receive PIA Inquiries within a few days of submitting their 471, and then move to Wave Ready Status as soon as they respond to the Inquiry.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Funding Commitments <\/strong>\u2013 The earliest that anyone will receive their E-rate Funding Commitment Decision Letters (FCDLs) will be the end of April.\u00a0 FCDL notifications will be e-mailed on a weekly basis, with a goal of issuing them all by September 1.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If you have any questions or need my assistance, please don\u2019t hesitate to contact me.\u00a0 Also, if you\u2019re having trouble with your Category 2 Bulk Uploads, please reach out to me right away &#8211; I have super skills when it comes to getting these to work. : )<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Julie<\/p>\n<p><strong>Julie Tritt Schell<\/strong><br \/>\nPennsylvania E-rate Coordinator<br \/>\n717-730-7133 &#8211; o<br \/>\n<a href=\"mailto:jtschell@comcast.net\">jtschell@comcast.net<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.e-ratepaorg.local\/\">www.e-ratepa.org<\/a><\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=eratepenn\" class=\"twitter-share-button\" data-size=\"large\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>March 5, 2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-listserve_archive"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29821\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}