PSAP Outage Alerts guide
Sarah Krawiec
This guide covers all the information needed to set up and manage PSAP Outage Alerts to assist you in complying with the FCC’s new PSAP outage reporting rules. PSAP Outage Alerts is a notification-as–a-service product that enables users to send notifications to Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) in the event of an outage that may be impacting 911 services. Notifications are sent in the form of email and/or text-to-speech (TTS) according to the preferred method designated by the receiving PSAP.
You can send and manage PSAP Alerts directly via the Bandwidth App or programmatically via the PSAP Outage Alerts API.
How do I send an outage alert to PSAPs?
To send alerts via the Bandwidth App:
- Log in to the Bandwidth App.
- In the side navigation bar, select Emergency and click PSAP Outage Alerts.
- Click Send a New Alert at the top of the page and complete the required fields. Please note that there are two tabs:
- PSAP Alert will send an email and/or TTS notification to the PSAPs
- Test Alert will send an email and TTS notification to the designated test contact email and phone number in your account – this is a great resource for periodic systems testing!
- Click Next to preview the TTS and email notification content. To return to the previous screen or make any adjustments to the alert content, click Back.
- Click Send Alert. At this point, the alert. is being processed – please see the “How do I know if an alert was successful?” section below for details on how to track its status.
To send alerts via the API, see PSAP Outage Alerts API.
The process outlined above describes how to send an initial alert for a new incident. To send updates for an existing incident or to send an all-clear notification, click the Update button in the rightmost column for the desired incident ID in the PSAP Outage Alerts table and complete the required fields.
Notification content
No matter which Bandwidth tool you use to send outage alerts, there is basic data that must be provided to execute successful notifications. Some of this information is collected at the time of onboarding for the PSAP Outage Alerts tool, and the rest is entered at the time of alert creation. Please see the table below for full details on the notification content.
| Field name | Field description | Allowed value | Field type | Where collected |
| Incident ID | Unique string identifying an outage incident | 1-10 numeric characters (no special characters) | Mandatory |
Freeform field entered at the time of alert creation Once an initial alert has been sent, the incident ID cannot be edited |
| Alert type | The type of alert you would like to send | Options:
|
Mandatory |
Drop-down selector entered at time of alert creation For new incident IDs, the alert type will automatically be selected as “initial” |
| Best-known cause of outage | The underlying cause of the outage | 0-100 alphanumeric characters (no special characters) in all lowercase format | Optional – will default to “unknown” if not supplied |
Freeform field entered at the time of alert creation This field will persist from initial alert to update and all-clear alerts but can be edited with each new alert for the same incident ID |
| Outage impact | Description of how the outage potentially affects the 911 special facility | Options:
|
Mandatory |
Drop-down selector entered at time of alert creation This field will persist from initial alert to update and all-clear alerts |
| Incident start date/time (UTC) | Date and time the outage incident began |
Time must be in UTC for API
|
Mandatory |
Date and time selector fields entered at the time of alert creation These fields will persist from initial alert to update and all-clear alerts |
| Expected restoration date/time (UTC) | Date and time the outage is expected to be resolved | Time must be in UTC | Optional – will default to “unknown” if not supplied |
Date and time selector fields entered at the time of alert creation These fields will persist from initial alert to update and all-clear alerts but can be edited with each new alert for the same incident ID |
| Resolved time | Date and time the outage has been resolved | Time must be in UTC | Mandatory | Date and time selector fields entered at the time of alert creation |
| Areas impacted | Geographic area(s) impacted by the 911 outage can be indicated:
|
FCC ID must be 1-10 numeric characters, separated by a comma, space, or line breaks API accepts a 2-digit code for state |
Mandatory |
Freeform field (FCC ID) or drop-down selector (state) entered at the time of alert creation This field will persist from initial alert to update and all-clear alerts |
| Notifying service provider contact information | Name, email address, and phone number for the designated internal point of contact for outages | Phone must be in E.164 format - leading + sign is optional | Mandatory | Collected at the time of product onboarding – will be automated into all notifications |
| Name of service provider experiencing outage | Name of your organization | – | Mandatory | Collected at the time of product onboarding – will be automated into all notifications |
| Type of service affected | Name of your organization’s 911 service | – | Optional – will default to “emergency voice calling” if not supplied | Collected at the time of product onboarding – will be automated into all notifications |
| Test contact information | Email address and phone number designated to receive sample email and TTS call | Phone number must be in E.164 format | Optional, but highly encouraged | Collected at the time of product onboarding – will be automated into TEST ALERT notifications |
How do I know if an alert was successful?
In the side navigation bar, click Emergency and select PSAP Outage Alerts. Here, you can see a table of all outage incidents, with the most recently updated ones at the top. This table shows a summary of pertinent information for outage alerts and contains hyperlinks where more detailed information is available.
Here are a few key data fields to note:
- Trigger ID – displays the auto-generated unique ID that is associated with the sent alert
- Status – displays the status of the incident, including:
- Detected – an incident has been opened, and only an initial alert has been sent
- Ongoing – an incident has received at least one update alert
- Resolved – an incident has received an all-clear alert and has been closed
- Areas impacted – displays either the number of US states or FCC IDs
- If you click View, a modal will appear that provides the names of the state(s) or the FCC ID(s) that were selected as the area(s) impacted by the outage
Each unique incident ID can have multiple associated alerts. Each of those alerts will have a unique order ID hyperlinked on the table. If you click into that order ID, you’ll be redirected to the Emergency Services Order Details page where you can see detailed information on the sent alert.
The Emergency Service Order Details page has the following 3 sections:
- Order information – displays order number, order type, and account information
- Incident details – displays a summary of the alert details (a shortened version of what is seen on the main table)
- Alerts – displays a list of every individual notification sent to a PSAP for a given alert, the status of that notification (Delivered, Processing, Failed), the alert type (email or TTS), and the name of the PSAP
- A summary of the total number of notifications sent, with a sum of each status, is displayed just below the table header
- This table view will always sort “failed” alerts first so that you can quickly see if a notification has not been successfully delivered
- You can export this file for sorting, filtering, management, or record-keeping as needed
To manage alerts via API, please see the PSAP Outage Alerts API.
How many alerts of each type can I send for an incident?
There are 3 different alert types (initial, update, and all-clear). For a unique incident ID, you can send an initial alert only once, this will create an “open” outage incident. You can send update alerts as many times as necessary, but you can send an all-clear alert only once. The all-clear alert will close out the open incident, and you won’t be able to send additional alerts for that same incident ID.
What should I enter for the “best known cause of outage”?
Our solution offers sufficient flexibility, enabling you to share your initial assessment of the best-known cause via a field that allows for up to 100 alphanumeric characters. If your initial assessment of the outage changes, this field can be modified for update or all-clear alerts.
Are there any restrictions on the order in which I can send alerts?
Yes, there are a few restrictions on when/how an alert can be sent:
- All new incident IDs must first have an initial alert before an update or all-clear alert can be sent.
- If an alert has been sent, another alert of any type (initial, update, or all-clear) cannot be sent until the previous alert has fully completed. You can tell if an alert has completed by looking at the “Alerts” section of the order details page – any individual notification that is still in “processing” status means the alert send has not fully completed. Note: A status of “failed” is not considered still processing.
What should I do if it is discovered that the area of impact is different from the one identified with the initial alert?
If the area impacted is smaller than originally identified with the initial alert, then you don’t have to take any action. The language sent to the PSAP is imprecise, phrased with “may be impacting” – this is to account for the possibility of an outage or potential outage impacting the 911 special facility.
If the area impacted is larger than originally identified with the initial alert, then you should create a new incident and new initial alert that contains the additional areas – this is to ensure that PSAPs are receiving all alerts in order of initial, update, and all-clear instead of adding PSAPs into the middle of an alert that is already in progress. This will require that both incident IDs are kept updated as the outage incident progresses.
How do I update my organization’s contact information, the name of our 911 product, or the designated test contact information?
All of these fields are collected at the time of product onboarding and assigned to your account so that all notifications are custom to your organization. To update any of these fields, please open a ticket with your Bandwidth Support Team for assistance.
If Bandwidth has an outage, should I send an alert to the PSAPs as well?
The FCC has determined that Originating Service Providers (OSPs) cannot simply rely upon underlying third-party providers to manage their reporting compliance obligations on their behalf; it is up to your organization to determine if an outage alert to the PSAPs is warranted.
Article is closed for comments.