|
(Last review or update: February 7, 2006) A.
Introduction. Since 1993, AKSYS (pronounced ack'sis) has provided the most
accurate, the most complete, and the fastest electronic filing
acknowledgement services to state revenue departments and transmitters. AKSYS provides all of a transmitter's acknowledgements of the same type and length in a single file for easy and efficient downloading, performs all necessary files maintenance for its customers, and gives each transmitter an accurate accounting every time he calls for his current file. Transmitters’ requests for repostings, by social security number, ETIN, EFIN, or Return Sequence Number are received on the dialup system or at the AKSYS Internet site, http://www.gacaksys.com, and the acknowledgements are reposted automatically, without charge, usually within minutes but not longer than twenty-four hours. Under its normal configuration, AKSYS can receive, process, and
transmit more than 100,000 acknowledgements per minute.
It can operate at that capacity indefinitely, and its maximum
operating capacity of more than 100 million acknowledgements each day is
more than all of the state revenue departments could generate in many
filing seasons. On the dialup system, AKSYS, not a caller, decides how long a connection lasts. AKSYS has a unique, copyrighted, case-sensitive access code feature that not only tells AKSYS who a caller is, but also what the caller wants to do. AKSYS performs the desired function(s) and disconnects. Because the average connect time between a user and AKSYS is less than 30 seconds, AKSYS needs only one-tenth the number of incoming lines of a bulletin board system with comparable capacity. B. Definitions. The following terms are
used in this specification. One acknowledgement unit equals one acknowledgement. AKSYS charges a transmitter sixteen cents ($.16) for each acknowledgement unit. Period of service is the time, normally between October 15 of one calendar year and October 31 of the next calendar year during which AKSYS will process acknowledgements for a transmitter as a condition of his having signed up or confirmed a current signup. A
billing cycle is one of five intervals in a period of service. The
billing cycles end on February 15, April 15,
August 15, October 31, and December 1.
Depending on the amount that a transmitter owes to AKSYS for
acknowledgement units processed (credit limit), at the end of each billing
cycle AKSYS may send the transmitter a bill or rollover the amount due to a
subsequent billing cycle. Credit limit is the same for all transmitters. Funds on deposit or deposit is the amount of deposit required from some
transmitters for service during a coming filing season. A
deposit is required only if it was necessary for AKSYS to send the
transmitter a late notice during a previous billing cycle. Prompt, Promptly refer to their meanings as used in commerce --
immediately or by a due date set in a statement of account (a bill). Repost, Reposting refer to the process by which AKSYS retrieves, at
the request of a transmitter or a revenue department, an acknowledgement
from the AKSYS Master Data System (MDS) and adds the acknowledgement,
without charge, to the transmitter’s current file. C. Features. 1.
Although AKSYS can respond to any commonly used protocol, the
preferred file transfer protocol with the dialup system is ZMODEM.
AKSYS no longer supports ASCII or KERMIT file transfer protocols,
or synchronous transmission and binary synchronous (bisynch) protocols on
its dialup systems. 2. AKSYS can connect at any standard transmission speed between 2,400
and 53,000 bits per second. AKSYS supports V.42/MNP 2-4 error control and
V.42bis/MNP 5 data compression.
Transmission speeds with the Internet site will depend on the
transmitter's Internet Service Provider. 3. AKSYS does not charge to repost (rehang) acknowledgements that have already been charged once to the transmitter. There is no charge for legitimate repostings. However, if a request for a reposting results in AKSYS finding acknowledgements that it could not post previously to a current file because AKSYS could not identify the owner of the acknowledgements, AKSYS will charge the transmitter sixteen cents for each acknowledgement found to be an original posting. Transmitters are required to request repostings by transmitting to AKSYS a file consisting of one or more social security numbers, ETINs, EFINs, or Return Sequence Numbers. Transmitters can use their page at the AKSYS Internet site to enter social security numbers, ETINs, EFINs, or Return Sequence Numbers for reposting. Except
under very unusual circumstances, AKSYS no longer will accept requests
from transmitters for
repostings by telephone or email; however AKSYS will continue to receive
such requests from revenue
departments. 4. AKSYS provides transmission acknowledgements to revenue departments each Monday. The transmission acknowledgements list for each revenue department the files of acknowledgements AKSYS has received from them, the number of acknowledgements AKSYS counted in each file, and the time and Julian date the acknowledgements were processed and posted. D. Security. 1. Dial-up Operations. AKSYS
is safe. Anyone can call and
connect with AKSYS. He will
receive nothing from the system. Unless
AKSYS receives a valid access code within fifteen
seconds, it will
disconnect without the caller knowing the identity of what he connected
with. Customers get only one chance to send an access code and a fifteen-second window in which to send it. Those constraints are part of AKSYS's security features and are designed to prevent unlawful access to the system by hackers. Customers
are not allowed to "shop around" as they might on other systems.
Transferring files requires only that a transmitter or a revenue
department connect and send an access code.
AKSYS will check the code and, if the code is valid, AKSYS will
send or receive one or more files. Then, it will disconnect.
If a transmitter or revenue department sends an access code in the
correct combination of upper and lower case, AKSYS will prepare to receive
a file of social security numbers or other data.
AKSYS will repost the acknowledgements that were requested. Every six months, AKSYS’s parent company conducts a
review of risks that have the potential to
disrupt AKSYS. Actions are taken to eliminate the risks or minimize their
impact. 2. Internet Operations. AKSYS employs physical, software, and procedural isolation (firewalls) to separate its main processing systems and databases from its Internet operations.
Based
on past experience, AKSYS can guarantee better than 99.99% system
availablity. Although
AKSYS has the most advanced and efficient reposting scheme in the world,
repostings seldom are necessary because most acknowledgments
arriving at AKSY are posted correctly and downloaded without problems. F. Technical Assistance. From
the IRS start date in January to April 20, technical assistance is
available from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm Eastern Time, seven
days a week. After April 20,
assistance is available from 9 am to 5 pm Eastern Time, Monday through Friday. From past experience, AKSYS has learned that customers do
not request technical assistance at other times. After downloading a few
files, most customers do not need help.
AKSYS does not charge for technical assistance. AKSYS
can provide expert technical assistance only in those areas that involve a
customer's interaction with AKSYS. Because
AKSYS cannot troubleshoot a customer's equipment or communications
software problems, customers with such problems should contact an
appropriate source for assistance, such as the computer or communications
software dealer or manufacturer. If
a customer has problems with his telephone circuits, he should call his
telephone company representative. Customers
must call (719) 475-7211 for AKSYS technical assistance
or use the technical assistance page at
http://www.gacaksys.com. AKSYS
cannot help software developers debug their software. G. Responsibilities. AKSYS can process only the acknowledgements that it receives.
It is not responsible for acknowledgements that a transmitter did
not receive because a state did not send them to AKSYS. AKSYS is responsible for the timely and accurate processing, and
posting to transmitters' current files, acknowledgements it receives from
revenue departments. AKSYS is
responsible for maintaining its hardware, software, and circuits in a high
state of readiness so callers can connect and transfer files efficiently.
AKSYS is not responsible for the condition of a customer's
equipment, software, or circuits, or for a transmitter's lack of
experience in computer communications or Internet operations. AKSYS provides toll-free service only to revenue departments.
Other customers must use a dial up
telephone service that is not toll-free or retrieve their acknowledgements
from http://www.gacaksys.com. H. The Structure of an Acknowledgement File. Appendix
1
describes the various fields in a standard
120-byte acknowledgement
record. AKSYS
processes files of acknowledgements received from revenue departments
immediately upon receipt. The
files
of acknowledgements sent to AKSYS by revenue departments may or may not
have header, separator, or trailer records.
AKSYS does not use such records in processing acknowledgements.
If they are included, AKSYS will remove them from the files. The
usual file received by AKSYS has only acknowledgement records.
The records in the files do not have to be in any order -- such as
in ascending order by ETIN, EFIN, or social security number. AKSYS
sorts the acknowledgement records and places them in files for each
transmitter, counts the new acknowledgements in each transmitter's file,
places each record in the file in the order in which it was received,
updates each transmitter's current information record (accounting record)
and appends a copy of the information record to the new current file. AKSYS adds the identification record 0120****THIS IS AKSYS.
(96 spaces + #) to
the beginning of each current file. Processing time is a few seconds for small files, a few minutes for longer files received during February. Immediately after processing, the acknowledgements are available for downloading. If
a transmitter does not download his current acknowledgement file it will
remain available to him until he calls for it. New acknowledgements
received for him will be added to his current file. After a transmitter has downloaded his current file, the file is
deleted. His new current file will consist of a header, a
dummy record, and his information (accounting) record. All
records in a current file are space-padded (alphabetic fields) or
zero-filled (numeric fields) to the 119th byte, if necessary, and each
record is terminated with "#". The
information record in the above example shows that AKSYS has processed
1289 acknowledgement units for the transmitter and that the transmitter
owes AKSYS $206.24 for the acknowledgements. Sample of a dummy file Sample
of a file with acknowledgements |