Dear Colleagues,

The RIPE NCC Executive Board has closely followed the ASN discussion on
the Address Policy Working Group mailing list. The issue of the RIPE NCC
Charging Scheme has been raised, so I'd like to give you an idea of the
Board's thinking on this. We hope this will inform the discussion
and also give sufficient time for members to give their feedback, which
we will take into account when making a Charging Scheme 2016 proposal to
present to the General Meeting (GM) in May this year.

The issue of reintroducing a charge for ASNs was raised at the last GM
in November 2014. You can follow the details of that discussion in the
GM minutes:
https://www.ripe.net/lir-services/ncc/gm/november-2014/minutes-ripe-ncc-general-meeting-november-2014

This discussion, interesting though it was, did not result in a conclusive outcome
on how the membership would like the Board to proceed with regard to ASNs.
It also raised the issue of charging for PI address space.
Another issue raised at the previous GM during the discussion on
providing RIPE NCC services for Legacy Internet resource holders was
that members can vote only to approve or reject the Charging Scheme as a
whole and they cannot vote on individual aspects of the Charging Scheme.

In trying to address the Charging Scheme-related issues raised, the
Board would like to make two statements:

Firstly, the Board would like to retain the current "one LIR, one fee"
Charging Scheme model that was approved by the membership and which
provides fairness, predictability and simplicity for RIPE NCC members.

Secondly, the Board strongly believes that the Charging Scheme should be
aligned with RIPE Policy. For this reason, there is a separate charge
for PI resources that ensures alignment with ripe-452, "Contractual
Requirements for Provider Independent Resource Holders in the RIPE NCC
Service Region (2007-01)".

With this in mind, the Board would like to offer two different proposals
for the Charging Scheme 2016:

1. The Board can propose a Charging Scheme in advance of the May GM and
have the membership discuss the proposal. The Board would take the
discussion into account before proposing a final Charging Scheme to be
voted on by the membership in May.

or

2. The Board could take a two-step approach to the Charging Scheme. In
May, members would vote on individual issues such as charging for ASNs.
The result of the voting would then be used to create a Charging Scheme
that would be voted on in the usual way by members at the November GM.

The RIPE NCC Executive Board is appointed to represent the interests of
the membership. For this reason, we encourage you to give us your
feedback on these proposals so that the RIPE NCC Charging Scheme 2016
can come as close as possible to reflecting the wishes of the membership.

You can discuss the proposal and related Charging Scheme issues on the
Members Discuss mailing list (members-discuss@ripe.net) or you can
contact the Board directly at exec-board@ripe.net. The next Executive
Board meeting takes place on 19 March, so we would appreciate your
feedback before that date.

I will also copy this mail to the Address Policy Working Group mailing
list to ensure all interested parties are aware of the Board's thinking.

Best regards,

Nigel Titley
RIPE NCC Executive Board Chairman