Communications

The total communications spend on fixed voice within the External Comm IT spend for the latest budget year. Includes the provision of local and long-distance services related to voice (calling charges; line rental/subscription and connection fees are included in this category); enhanced voice services; data and fax transmission over the circuit-switched PSTN; Voice over IP (Excludes wholesale or carrier-to-carrier revenue and services).

The total communications spend on fixed data within the External Comm IT spend for the latest budget year. The provision of dedicated/private line, packet and circuit-switched access services (for example, frame relay, asynchronous transfer mode, IP, Integrated Services Digital Network, DSL, multichannel multipoint distribution service [MMDS] and satellite) services. All types of transmissions — non-voice data, image, video, fax, interactive services and even voice can be carried by these services regardless of whether the source format is analog or digital.

The total communications spend on mobile services within the External Comm IT spend for the latest budget year. Provision of mobile telephone calls and mobile data usage (Short Message Service [SMS] and mobile data access) through portable or mobile terminals that communicate through ground based wireless cell towers.

The total communications spend on satellite communications services within the External Comm IT spend budget for the latest budget year. Telephone and data services provided through portable or mobile terminals that communicate via telecommunications satellites.