[40781] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Definition of a burstable circuit
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Patrick Greenwell)
Wed Aug 22 14:03:31 2001
Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2001 11:02:17 -0700 (PDT)
From: Patrick Greenwell <patrick@cybernothing.org>
To: "Stanley, Jon" <Jon.Stanley@savvis.net>
Cc: "'nanog@nanog.org'" <nanog@nanog.org>
In-Reply-To: <537CFA8B9734D311A2330090274EA45B0C0D1BAA@exchstl2.bridge.com>
Message-ID: <20010822105124.W49052-100000@unagi.cybernothing.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Errors-To: owner-nanog-outgoing@merit.edu
On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Stanley, Jon wrote:
>
> Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem
> that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
>
> In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the
> customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an
> entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for
> usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th
> percentile reporting)
>
> In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited
> from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time
> by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe
> (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
>
> Any input would be appreciated.
The holder of the latter view is confused. (does that count as religious?)
Seriously, what all the providers I have experience with have done is let
you burst to whatever the link capacity is and charge a premium on the
overage above the normal committed per Mb rate, or bump you to the next
committment level once you have sustained an overage for a period of time.
While it can make traffic engineering a little more difficult, both of these
represents a revenue opportunity.
If you take the first approach and charge a premium it has the advantage of
generally being self-corrective when you explain to the customer they are
paying more by not making a larger bandwidth committment. Taking the second
approach is easier for you, generates additional revenue, but could be more of
a billing/customer service hassle.
