911/E911 NOTIFICATION, DISCLOSURES AND TERMS

Dated Septemer 30, 2024

 This 911/E911 Notification, Disclosure and Terms (“911 Notice”) is a material part of the Terms of Service governing TBC Communications’ (“TBCC,” “we” or “us”) VoIP services (the “Services”).  The customer obtaining the Services (“Subscriber” or “you”) represents, warrants and agrees that it has read, understood and agrees to these limitations, restrictions and terms applicable to calling 911 using the Services.  Subscriber represents and warrants that it shall provide clear and conspicuous notice, in language substantially similar to that contained in this Addendum, to all of Subscriber’s employees, agents, contractors, guests, invitees or any other person accessing the Services under Subscriber’s account (“Users”).

Enhanced 911 Versus Basic or Limited E911.

Our 911 dialing (“911 Dialing”) is different from traditional 911 service. Subscribers have access to either basic 911 or Enhanced 911 (“E911”) service, depending on the capability of their Public Safety Answering Point (“PSAP”) or other emergency center.  Subscriber and its underlying carriers and service providers (“Vendors”) have no control over, and shall have no responsibility or liability for, the ability of any PSAP or other emergency call center to provide E911, receive or process any 911 call or any information provided with such call, or provide any level of 911 service.

Enhanced E911 Service. With E911 service, when you dial 911, your telephone number and registered address is simultaneously sent to the local emergency center assigned to your location, and emergency operators have access to the information they need to send help and call you back if necessary.

Basic and Limited E911 Service. Users in locations where the emergency center is not equipped to receive, capture, or retain your telephone number and/or address have basic 911 or, to the extent technically feasible, limited E911. With basic 911 or limited E911, the local emergency operator answering the call may not have your call back number or your exact location, so you must be prepared to give them this information. Until you give the operator your phone number, he or she may not be able to call you back or dispatch help if the call is dropped or disconnected, or if you are unable to speak.

As additional local emergency centers upgrade to E911 and become capable of receiving all of our customers' information, TBCC will use commercially reasonable efforts to upgrade customers with basic or limited 911 to E911 service. TBCC will not give you notice of the upgrade.

By using the Services, you authorize TBCC to disclose your telephone number, name, and address to third parties involved with providing 911 Dialing to you, including, without limitation, our Vendors, call routers, PSAPs, and other call centers and local emergency centers.

 911 Dialing is Different Than Traditional 911 Service.

You understand and acknowledge, and shall inform all Users of, the important differences in and limitations of, TBCC’s 911 Dialing as compared with 911 services provided by traditional telephone services. It is your responsibility, in accordance with the instructions that accompany the Service, to provide clear and conspicuous notice to all Users of the limitations and restrictions on 911 Dialing contained in this 911 Notice. 

Differences between 911 Dialing using the Services and traditional 911/E911 services include the following, along with other limitations and conditions described in this Notice:

You Must Register Your Physical Location.

For each phone line, telephone number, device or seat (each a “Line”) that you utilize with the Services, you must register with TBCC the physical location (including validated street address, floor and suite/unit/room number) where you or the User will be using the Services with that Line (the “Registered Location”). You can complete the registration of your initial location via our online management portal. It is incumbent on you to confirm the accuracy of your, or the applicable User’s Registered Location. If you or any of your Users have any changes to the physical location where you are using a Line, you must update the Registered Location of such Line via our online management portal. If Subscriber fails to provide an accurate physical address, fails to provide any address at all or fails to update the Registered Location of a Line when such Line is moved to a new location and dials 911, 911 calls will not be routed to the appropriate PSAP or other emergency center.  TBCC reserves the right to charge Subscriber for our reasonable costs per call in the event that Subscriber uses or attempts to use 911 Dialing without registering or updating a Registered Location for each Line as required by this paragraph.

Outages May Disrupt Our Service and/or E911 Dialing.

 Power Failure or Disruption. 911 Dialing does not function in the event of a power failure or disruption. If there is an interruption in the power supply, the Services, including 911 Dialing, will not function until power is restored. Following a power failure or disruption, you may need to reset or reconfigure the device(s) used with the Services prior to utilizing the Services, including 911 Dialing.

Service Outages Due to Internet Outage or Suspension or Disconnection of Broadband Service or Internet Service Company ("ISP") Service. Service outages or suspensions or disconnections of service by the underlying broadband provider or ISP , for any reason including without limitation your failure to timely pay for services, will prevent all of our VoIP Services, including 911 Dialing, from functioning.

Service Outage Due to Disconnection of Your Account. Service outages due to disconnection, termination or temporary suspension of your account for any reason, including without limitation non-payment or violations of the Acceptable Use Policy in our Terms of Service, will prevent all TBCC Services, including 911 Dialing, from functioning.

Service Outages Due to Customer Premise Equipment, ISP or Broadband Company Blocking of Ports or Other Acts. Your firewall, ISP, broadband provider or other third party may intentionally or inadvertently block the ports over which the Services are provided or otherwise impede the usage of the Services, including 911 Dialing. If you suspect this has happened to you, you should alert us to this situation, and we will work with you to attempt to resolve the issue. During the period that the ports are being blocked or your VoIP Services are impeded, the Services, including 911 Dialing, may not function. You acknowledge that TBCC is not responsible for the blocking of ports by any firewall or third party or any other impediment to your usage of our Services, and any loss of our Services, including 911 Dialing, which may result. In the event you lose service as a result of blocking of ports or any other impediment to your usage of the Service, you will continue to be responsible for payment for the TBCC service charges unless and until you disconnect the VoIP Services in accordance with our Terms of Service.

Other Service Outages. If there is a service outage for any reason, such outage will prevent all TBCC VoIP Service, including 911 Dialing, from functioning. Such outages may occur for a variety of reasons, including, but not limited to, those reasons described elsewhere in this Notice.

Network Congestion May Reduce Speed of Routing or Answering 911 Dialing Calls.

There may be a greater possibility of network congestion and/or reduced speed in the routing of a 911 Dialing call made utilizing our Services as compared to traditional 911 dialing over traditional public telephone networks.

Changes to Your Address or Use of a Non-Native Number May Cause Delays in Assistance.

Changes to your Registered Location as described above require processing, and delays in updating your new address in an applicable automatic location information (ALI) database may impair or restrict the ability of emergency personnel to help you. You should allow at least 12-24 hours for the ALI database to update before your new Registered Location will be available to emergency personnel, where available. In addition, if you move to a location that uses a different area code, exchange or other number system from the telephone number that has been assigned to you, processing your emergency call may be delayed by a local emergency center.

Direct Access to 9-1-1 Service Required

If you subscribe to a VoIP Service consisting of multiple Lines (a “multiline telephone system” or  “MLTS”), you further acknowledge, understand and agree to the following:

A business owner or operator that owns or controls an MLTS and provides outbound dialing capacity or access shall be required to configure the MLTS to allow a person initiating a 9-1-1 call on the system to directly access 9-1-1 without an additional code, digit, prefix, postfix, or trunk-access code.  

A business owner or operator that provides residential or business facilities utilizing an MLTS shall configure the telephone or equivalent system to provide a notification to a central location on the site of the residential or business facility when a person within the residential or business facility dials 9-1-1, provided that the business owner or operator’s system is able to be configured to provide such notification without an improvement to the system’s hardware. The requirement of this subsection does not require a business owner or operator to have a person available at the central location to receive such notification.

You are responsible for managing and directing the configuration and operation of any MLTS Service ordered by you. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, Subscriber will be responsible for managing its use of the Services and its operation of all equipment and devices used with the Services in accordance with all applicable laws. Your obligations shall include, without limitation, (a) designating one or more administrators who are authorized to order Lines or modifications to the Services, or to reconfigure hardware used with the Services; (b) determining the number of Lines  required for your needs, the assignment and re-assignment of Lines among its Users, and changes in the number, location or other characteristics of Lines required; and (c) the day-to-day operations of the Services.  Subscriber acknowledges and agrees that a separate telephone/DID must be purchased and assigned to each device that is capable of or configured to place outbound calls to the public switched telephone network in order for 911 Dialing to function properly for such device.

Outside the United States. If Subscriber uses the Service from a location outside the United States, Subscriber will not be able to use 911 Dialing.

E911 Provisioning Intervals. Provisioning 911 Dialing may take additional time following the activation of the Service, during which time 911/E911 emergency calling may not be available or additional fees may be incurred.

Required Information. In some circumstances, the User may need to advise emergency service personnel of the nature of the emergency, the caller’s telephone number, or the caller’s physical location. If a call is disconnected for any reason, emergency service personnel may not be able to call the caller back, determine the caller’s physical location, or dispatch emergency personnel to the caller’s location.

Physical Location. For E911 Service to work properly, the Registered Location in TBCC’s  records MUST correspond to the physical location from which the User uses the Services. A P.O. Box is not sufficient to use as a physical address. The emergency service dispatcher will only send emergency service personnel to Subscriber’s or the applicable User’s Registered Location.

Information. Subscriber will be responsible for accurately providing TBCC with all information necessary to ensure the accuracy of each Automatic Location Identification (“ALI”) and Public Safety Answering Position, including, but not limited to, all Direct Inward Dialing ("DID")/Direct Outward Dialing ("DOD") numbers, and a correct and valid emergency response address for each DID/DOD number. Further, Subscriber must furnish all updates of this information to us. All of Subscriber's information must be accurately provided and provisioned in the Automatic Number Identification (“ANI”) database to provide full 911 service functionality. If a 911 call is made from an invalid, non-provisioned, or improperly provisioned telephone number, the call will not be normally and automatically routed to the correct PSAP and may be routed to the backbone E911 provider's 24/7 Emergency Call Routing Center (“ECRC”). In such event, a per-call charge will be billed to Subscriber at a rate determined by TBCC from time to time. 911 calls rely on the proper assignment of caller ID and calls that are not properly assigned a provisioned number as a caller ID will result in call failures and/or incurred fees. Do not block the telephone number on the handset when dialing 911, and instruct your Users not to do so.

Additional Considerations. If an address provided for by Subscriber or its Users cannot be recognized by the system and/or cannot be geo-coded, neither TBCC or its third-party carriers, or such other third parties utilized by such carriers, assumes any liability or responsibility for providing emergency calling services for the telephone number associated with such address. In situations where emergency call routing uses ECRC, and (i) if caller cannot speak or identify his or her address; (ii) data connectivity between the address database and the ECRC is interrupted; or (iii) the caller's location information cannot be provided, Subscriber acknowledges that the TBCC and any Vendor shall have no ability to assist the caller and Subscriber understands and acknowledges and commits to informing its Users of the nature and limitations of 911 Dialing over the Services. Subscriber acknowledges and agrees that neither TBCC nor any of its affiliates, channel partners or Vendors will be liable for any outage (whether of the Services, electrical power or third party networks) and/or inability of a caller to dial 911 or to access emergency service personnel due to the characteristics and limitation of the Services. Subscriber understands that all calls must be delivered with the appropriate calling party number (“CPN”) representing the caller's actual geographic location. Subscriber will be responsible for 911 configurations for all active CPNs. “Valid CPN” means the calling party's actual assigned ten (10)-digit telephone number within the North American Numbering Plan assigned by TBCC, excluding special purpose phone numbers such as 8XX, 950, 555 and N11. Delivery of valid CPN is a material obligation of Subscriber hereunder. If Subscriber does not deliver valid CPN, TBCC may not be able to complete the call.

Call Volume. If the number of 911 calls from Subscriber’s Users exceeds three percent (3%) of the total call records managed on behalf of Subscriber in TBCC’s ALI database in any applicable month, TBCC may charge Subscriber a surcharge per call, in an amount established by TBCC from time to time.

Disclaimer of Liability and Indemnification.

TBCC does not have any control over whether, or the manner in which, calls using 911 Dialing are answered or addressed by any PSAP or other local emergency response center. TBCC disclaims any and all responsibility for the conduct of PSAP or local emergency response centers. TBCC  relies on third parties to assist it in routing 911 Dialing calls and disclaims any and all liability or responsibility in the event such third party data used to route calls is incorrect or yields an erroneous result.

None of TBCC, its affiliates, Vendors or channel partners, or any of their partners, shareholders, members, directors, managers, officers, employees or agents (“TBCC Parties”) may be held liable for any claim, cause of action, damage, loss, liability, expense, cost, fee, charge, or penalty arising out of or related to your use of 911 Dialing, and by using TBCC’s Services you hereby waive any and all such claims, causes of action, damages, losses, liabilities, expenses, costs, fees, charges, or penalties, arising from or relating to the 911 Dialing Service unless such claims, causes of action, damages, losses, liabilities, expenses, costs, fees, charges, or penalties arose solely from TBCC’s gross negligence or willful misconduct.

WITHOUT LIMITING THE FOREGOING OR ANY PROVISION OF THE TERMS OF SERVICE, TBCC EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, FOR OR REGARDING 911 DIALING, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Subscriber shall defend, indemnify, and hold harmless the TBCC Parties, and any other service provider who furnishes services to you in connection with TBCC’s Services, from any and all claims, causes of action, damages, losses, liabilities, expenses, costs, fees, charges, or penalties (including, without limitation, attorneys’ fees) by, or on behalf of, you or any third party relating to the absence, failure or outage of the VoIP Service, including 911 Dialing, incorrectly routed 911 Dialing calls, your failure to comply with the terms and limitations in this Notice (including without limitation your failure to provide or timely update any location information or other information required hereunder), your failure to clearly and conspicuously notify any User of the terms and limitations in this Notice, and/or the inability of any User of TBCC’s Service to be able to use 911 Dialing or access emergency service personnel.

You May Want to Make Alternate 911 Arrangements or Choose Not to Use Our Services.

If you are not comfortable with the limitations of the 911 Dialing Service, you should consider having an alternate means of accessing traditional 911 or E911 services or disconnecting our VoIP Service.