Telecom Expense Management Vital for Cell Phones

                                                                                         

Industry sources estimate that a quarter of telecom costs are now spent on wireless, which amounts to a U.S. total of about thirty-three billion dollars a year. While landline telephone services have dropped dramatically in price in recent years, the costs of cell phones and other wireless devices and services are more than making up for that reduction, emphasizing the need for telecom expense management (TEM).

These days most traveling salespersons and executives are provided with a cell phone paid for by the company. When used for business purposes these can undoubtedly improve corporate effectiveness and profitability, but without oversight these resources will tend to become underused, overused, misused or abused.

In about half the companies, not only is mobile usage unmonitored, but often cellular charges are hidden among other items in employees’ expense reports, so that executives have no more than a vague idea of their monthly wireless costs. The result is that companies are often unaware that they are grossly overpaying for their wireless services.

In order for a company to get a handle on cell phone usage, centralization is necessary. Once all wireless service invoices for the company are received at one central location, it will become feasible to get a more accurate idea of monthly wireless costs. The next step should be to centralize procurement of wireless devices and services as well. This will make it possible to standardize on a limited number of carriers and to negotiate favorable terms.

A case in point is a corporation with about twenty-two thousand employees worldwide, with about ten percent of them using company-paid cell phones. A telecom audit revealed that the company was paying about 25 cents per minute of cell phone usage. This high price was largely the result of roaming charges and employees who exceeded their monthly maximum number of minutes. When this was corrected, the cost per minute dropped to about half that amount.

Company PBX systems have for a long time provided call detail records (CDR) on landline telephone usage, where origin, destination, time of day, date and duration are recorded for each call. TEM software can collect and store these CDRs, compute their cost and compare the data against carriers’ invoices. Some TEM providers now also provide this capability for cell phones. With certain adaptations to the cell phone, CDRs are made available to the TEM system, which makes it possible to manage wireless usage and control costs. Wireless cost reductions of typically over twenty percent have been reported.

Once usage patterns are known, policy can then be evolved to optimize wireless usage and to negotiate better terms with carriers.

For more information on wireless expense management and telecom expense management visit the Telsoft Solutions website at www.telsoft-solutions.com.

About the author:
Author, Peter Verhoeff, writes articles on the business benefits of telecom expense management systems and call detail record technology. More information can be found at http://www.telsoft-solutions.com.

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