You may have received an email from USAC today asking you to update your existing FCC Form 498. You may also be receiving two copies of this email as I am sending it to the Networkmaine-ERate list as well as to every account administrator and Form 471 contact for Maine entities with an FY2019 Form 471 (if you didn't receive two copies, you should sign up for the list - it's free!).

The reason for these emails is that all federal agencies  –  including USAC –  are required to comply with The Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014, or DATA Act. The DATA Act is the nation’s first open data law and requires the U.S. federal government to transform its spending information into open data. The goal of the act is to make information on federal expenditures more easily accessible by establishing government-wide standards for identifying entities receiving funds – including recipients of E-Rate funds.

USAC is taking steps to become compliant and is asking all E-Rate applicants to modify their existing Form 498 to provide the information required by the act, which is your organization's business type. In addition, if you didn't provide a DUNS Number when you first created your Form 498, you should also take this opportunity to include that number on your form while you are modifying it.

Although the attached instructions may seem daunting, it should take you less than five minutes to make this modification to your existing form. You will not be required to resubmit a voided check or other substantiating documentation.

In case you are new to the E-Rate program and have not filed any Form 498 yet, instructions are also attached for creating a new form.

Please take the time to modify your Form 498 in EPC at your earliest convenience.