Wide Area Network

The N.C. Department of Information Technology’s wide area network service provides fully managed services and statewide IP data communications connectivity. 

The WAN service connects your local area networks to the internet using the state’s core network infrastructure. This service is available to any authorized government entity at commercial rates. 

NCDIT also provides consultation to aid in the appropriate data service selection.

Request Wide Area Network

Getting Help

SupportGet Technical Support
NCDIT Service Desk: 919-754-6000
Support Hours24/7
Tab/Accordion Items

Features

  • Redundant core network infrastructure
  • Redundant high-capacity connections to the internet
  • Turn-key solution with all the necessary equipment to interface the service with customers’ LAN, including assignment of IP addresses and domain name service
  • Service package offerings, including guaranteed WAN and best-effort broadband 
  • Consultation regarding service options and network configurations
  • 24/7 support via the NCDIT Service Desk and Incident Management Center
  • Full-service network monitoring, configuration management and availability management

Benefits

  • You can reallocate limited financial and human IT resources to other initiatives because the WAN service provides a fully managed offering. It includes provisioning, monitoring and repair and covers your premise equipment.
  • Complete service installation is typically performed within 90-120 days to ensure network integrity, performance and customer satisfaction.
  • NCDIT ensures deployment of the optimum network configuration to meet your objectives.

Request Process

To request this service, or for more information, submit a ticket using the NCDIT Service Portal.

Authorization

  • Service requests that incur a cost to the agency will typically require approval from the requesting agency’s CIO, financial officer or manager, depending upon your agency's requirements. 
  • Any staff with access to the NCDIT Service Portal may engage the team for support or information.

Requirements & Customer Responsibility

Required NCDIT ServicesNone
Other Technical Requirements & Prerequisites
  • Available transport technologies in your geographic area
  • Telecommunications service provider(s) available in your geographic area
Customer Responsibility
  • Agency staff are required to submit a ticket using the NCDIT Service Portal for additional support or information regarding this service. 
  • The staff and agency receiving services are also responsible for coordinating service installation with their telecommunication service provider.
  • Other technical responsibilities include:
    • Providing proper connectivity from the customer's LAN to WAN service components
    • Designating a 24/7 point of contact for NCDIT
    • Adhering to the State Network Acceptable Use Policy

Expected Delivery

Acknowledgment TimeThe service team should acknowledge a service request within about 2-3 business days.
Turnaround Time
  • The service team should be able to complete a well-defined service request within approximately 90-120 days, depending on circuit installation requirements.
  • Procurement and licensing steps required before the delivery of services may extend the timeline.  

Customers

Suggested ForAny state or local government agency as well as educational institutions
Required ForAll state agencies
Spotlight CustomersNot available

Support ProcessSubmit a ticket using the NCDIT Service Portal or contact the NCDIT Service Desk at 919-754-6000.
Service Support HoursSupport for the service is available 24/7. Response and restoration are dependent upon the WAN Service Level Agreement.
Service AvailabilityThe service is available 24/7, excluding planned outages and maintenance windows.
Standard Maintenance Windows
  • Sundays: 4 a.m. to noon
  • Tuesdays: 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. for core infrastructure updates
  • Thursdays: 4-7 a.m.
  • Weekdays: 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. for customer edge hardware updates
  • Provisioning MACD: scheduled with customer
  • Site-specific and service-specific changes may be coordinated with customers at non-standard times
  • Each telecommunications vendor has standard maintenance windows that apply to transport service
Service Communications
  • Changes or outages that might have an impact on customers are communicated through the NCDIT Communications Hub and Agency Change Advisory Board. 
  • The agency's admin for this service will support communications to the agency users of the service.
Service Level Agreements

  • Approved rates for this service are published in the NCDIT Rate Schedule.
  • Three components of WAN service incur monthly recurring charges:
    • Core – costs for hardware, software and maintenance of the core network infrastructure and management of WAN service
    • Transport – telecommunications provider costs for connecting the customer location to the regional point-of-presence (RPoP)
    • CPE – costs for hardware, software and maintenance of customer premise edge equipment
  • One-time charges are incurred for:
    • Installation of customer premise equipment
    • Telecommunications providers installation of the last-mile transport service
       

View NCDIT Rate Schedule

Service Features

Best Effort WAN Service Offerings Guaranteed WAN Service Offerings
Service level targets: None Service Level Targets:
  • Availability – 99.5 %
  • MTTRSP 1 Hour
  • MTTR <= 4 hours (no dispatch)
  • MTTR <= 8 hours (dispatch required)
Asymmetrical Bandwidth Tiers Symmetrical Bandwidth Tiers
(T1x128k to 200x10M) (T1-2M to 1G)
No guaranteed bandwidth (highly oversubscribed) Guaranteed bandwidth (available for all service tiers)
Transport options (broadband - DSL, cable, 4G cellular) Transport options (ethernet, frame relay, metro fiber)
Internet connectivity included Internet connectivity included
Agency ESAP1 included (cloud-based security) Agency ESAP1 included (cloud-based security)
Router hardware and maintenance included Router hardware and maintenance included
IP address management:
IPv4 public \ private address assignments, Domain Name Services (DNS) and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP)		 IP address management:
IPv4 public \ private address assignments, Domain Name Services (DNS) and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP)
No prioritization of traffic (No QoS) Prioritization of traffic (QoS)
No multitenant routing High availability (HA) options

1 ESAP is defined as centrally managed secure access for all ingress/egress traffic to/from agency virtual networking private routing domain(s).

Service Support

Best Effort WAN Service Offerings Guaranteed WAN Service Offerings
24/7 support2 24/7 support
24/7 device monitoring 24/7 device monitoring
Performance utilization reporting Performance utilization reporting
Equipment technology refresh Equipment technology refresh
Patch/firmware upgrades Patch/firmware upgrades
Incident tickets can only be opened as low priority3 Incident tickets opened as low/medium/high/critical3

2 Vendor support for these technologies varies and is not available 24/7. 

3 Guaranteed WAN service follows the response and resolution times described in the Priority Model (See Global Service Levels). Vendor support for Best Effort WAN service delivered via broadband technologies varies, preventing NCDIT from meeting the target resolution times. Therefore, the response and resolution times for incidents for best effort broadband services will correspond to a Low Priority.
 

Training & Help 

None

Other Related Links

Related NCDIT Services