Do you need smartphone policy consulting, a cell phone bill audit or a telecom audit project?  Contact the telecom audit experts at BottaBoom today.  You can call them at 1-888-487-5326 or visit this link at telecom audit contact page.

It is astounding to me how many companies do not have a comprehensive corporate wireless policy or centralized control over their wireless enterprises.  However, during a telecom audit, management quickly realizes how valuable a company-wide cell phone policy is when we implement one for them. A comprehensive corporate cell phone policy is an absolute must in today’s business environment for three main reasons:

• A wireless smart phone policy is needed to help companies maximize their telecom cost savings and prevent wasted expense.  Cost savings are most often immediate and significant.  For most large companies, on average, telecommunications expense is now one of their three largest expenses, and the smart phone and wireless portion of that telecom expense is often the majority of that huge expense. Many companies have no idea how to control their smart phones and other wireless device usage and costs.

• Management must assert control over the wireless enterprise in order to control telecommunications usage by employees, and to satisfy current strict IRS usage requirements.

• Companies need to limit corporate liability by prohibiting their workers utilizing wireless devices when they operate vehicles on the job; otherwise companies are leaving themselves exposed to potentially huge lawsuits.  Some lawsuits involving negligence by companies using cell phones on the job which results in accidents and injury are approaching millions of dollars in civil  judgments.

So now you know why you need a company cell phone policy, however, how are you going to develop a good wireless policy for your employees? As a telecommunications consultant who has written numerous cell-phone policies in the past, I recommend the following tips for writing a great company cell phone policy that will last for years into the future and will make your management take notice of your ability to control the out of control wireless monster wreaking havoc within your company.

1. Research, research, research. Benchmark with other companies. Join Telecom Audit Professionals International (TAPI) on Linked in and solicit advice from other telecom auditors and accountants. Ask peers for information and sample policies.

2. A good wireless policy should clearly outline who in the company is specifically responsible for wireless protocol, including ordering of devices, data and calling features, and administration of cost and all anything related to wireless activities.

3. The company cell phone policy should be a public relations device that provides the foundation for communicating your smart phone device to your employees on a regular basis. As your cell phone and blackberry plans change at least yearly, you should advise your employees regularly on guidelines and what limitations and features their plans contain for them.  How many peak and off peak minutes are employees allowed to use each month? They need to know this and clearly understand it.

4. Prohibit costly extra charges. Employees should not be allowed to use their carrier’s 411 directory assistance service. These costs are as high as $3.00 per lookup and can add up quickly. For directory assistance, encourage employees to program speed dial numbers on their smartphones for google411 or AT&T’s free directory assistance service. Prohibit picture sharing, texting (or place employees on the appropriate texting plan), and GPS downloads. The cell phone policy should state that the employee will be responsible for payment of these premium charges.

5. Equipment may only be ordered through the cell phone administrator. This will allow your company to maintain centralized control and ensure you are getting volume discounts across the enterprise though your wireless phone contract.

6. Make sure that company issued cell phones are used strictly for business use only. Employees should reimburse the company for personal calls or will need to specify a percentage of personal cell phone usage each month in order to meet current IRS taxation requirements.

7. Strictly forbid driving, operating any kind of hazardous machinery or equipment and using a cell phone while on company time. No exceptions. Again, this portion of the company cell phone policy needs to be reinforced with monthly emails or employee relations notifications, i.e.: company newsletters, noted on company blogs etc.
8. Lost, damaged or stolen equipment must be reported to the telecommunications wireless administrator immediately.

9. Separation of employment. The cell phone policy should clearly state that the wireless device and phone number belongs to the company, not the employee. Why? Losing a wireless device and phone number can mean a lot of lost sales and clients, as employees who take their wireless phones and numbers with them often take valuable information and client contacts with them, often to your competitors.

10. Have each employee sign the cell phone policy, agreeing that they have reviewed and understand the requirements within it. Also, the cell phone policy should be a main topic during new employee orientation and ongoing training classes.

In summary, the central part of best practice in managing wireless devices and telecommunications costs comes down to control. Without a clear, comprehensive and enforced cell phone policy, you have no control over wireless expense or use in your company. Again, you need to get control of your company wireless costs and maximize telecom cost savings and limit legal liability.

About the author: Mark Evans is Principal and founder of BottaBoom.com, a nationally recognized telecom audit company based in Tucson, Arizona, with additional offices in California and Virginia. Mark and his telecom audit staff has been saving companies large sums of money on their telecom bills for over 25 years.  If you need a professional telecom audit project or help with your cell phone bill contract or policy, mobile expenses, landline or data expense, or a cell phone bill audit, contact BottaBoom telecom audit Services at 1-888-487-5326 or go to their contact us page on the web.

As a professional telecommunications audit professional, I find some major blame with the telephone companies for much of this fiscal nightmare.  U.S. telecommunication companies are still over-billing U.S. businesses by well over 38 billion per year!  Within that number is a lot of peoples’ jobs that we could save if we could stop this injustice!  The sad thing is, with some focused attention, we can easily curb these telecommunications inefficiencies by the telecommunications companies.

Historically, nothing has changed in that U.S. businesses continually throw good telecommunications money down the toilet.  In 1997, over 80% of business telecommunications bills had some kind of error associated with them.  Today, the billing overcharges still remain close to 80%.  It’s been this way for years!  Don’t you think that with advent the most recent recession and all of the recurring cost efficiency talk in the past that company business managers would finally wake up and start trying to recoup the billions of dollars in lost expense they are paying unnecessarily to the phone companies every day?  Well, it’s just not happening and as I’ve said over the past 25 years, its time for bold action.

I am amazed that there are still thousands of companies who continue to overpay on their telecommunications costs and needlessly waste money.

As a contingency fee-based audit company, it is our job to stop the bleeding and recoup that 38 billion in (easily) recoverable money.  Here is my action plan for your company to recoup your fair share of those billions in telecom cost savings:

1. Conduct a business inventory of your telecommunications services.  Quite simply, I’ll make sure that you have and use the telecommunications lines that you are paying for.  Believe me, it’s easier said than done, it takes hard work, but it will pay off for your business. You’d be shocked to learn about all of the telecommunications lines you pay for that don’t work anymore!
2. Let me call your telecommunications sales representative on your behalf, and tell them we are trying to save your company money.  I’ll tell the rep that they have an opportunity to be a hero and continue to get your future business. I’ll ask them to suggest cost saving ideas for us.  You’d be surprised at some of the value-added responses we’ll get and some of these cost savings suggestions will actually help you realize some significant cost efficiencies.  I’ll be more than happy to ask the question on your behalf and allow you to reap the majority of the benefits.
3. Allow me to compare that great service contract deal you recently signed with your actual telephone bill.  Please don’t be shocked to find that the telephone company is not living up to their end of the deal.  Everyone thinks that once the ink dries, the deal is done and they close the books.  Well, the deal is not done; it’s just begun, so let’s analyze the results by scrutinizing the bill and compare it to the contract to see if the telephone company is true to their word.  I’m going into this exercise with some serious doubts about the validity of the telecommunications billing system; how about you?
4. Let’s stop cramming.  Allow me to check the 3^rd party billing charges on your phone bills.  I’ll bet you’re being crammed and I’ll be happy to get all of that money back for you.  I’ll check the last page of your local telephone bill, and then I’ll go back to the crammers and get you all of your money back.
5. Let’s check your PBX and VOIP service agreement pricing and contract terms and conditions.  I am pleased that you have a wonderful new VOIP system, and your bids produced the lowest price for your system.  However, you’re paying $150-$250 per hour to your vendor in telecom maintenance fees.  They’ve got to make up for the lost revenue on the sales deal so they’re sticking you with huge maintenance fees and hidden telecom maintenance coverage you don’t need for the next several years.  There are alternative, its time to put a stop to that.
6. Let’s do a thorough cell phone audit.  We’ll find all those employees racking up tons of charges for texting their relatives and loved ones on your company’s dime.  We’ll also find the download charges for all of those picture sharing privileges and extra shared minutes spent unproductively.  I’ll talk you into allowing me to write a telecommunications usage policy for your company, which will simply set guidelines for your employees, guidelines that they previously did not know existed because they did not exist.  This simple act will save you thousands of dollars in wasted telecommunications expense.   We’ll review smart-phone purchases and costs, and ensure that your wireless network and cell phone cost is under control.
7. Let’s do some traffic studies on all of those telephone lines and data lines you have.  In many instances, I’ll find that up to 50% of those lines are not being used.  Let’s do the traffic study analysis and cut the lines as needed.
8. Well check out those telecommunications taxes and surcharges.  Are you an educational institution?  A Credit Union? A healthcare facility?  A non- profit organization, an Native American owned entity?  Its time to do an analysis of all of your telephone taxes to see if each one is correct.
9. Let’s do a telecom fraud analysis.  Are calls being made at 3 am to strange countries from your headquarters?  Do employees report strange activity on their voice mail?  Are VOIP and PBX features monitored to ensure outside callers are not penetrating your system to conduct criminal activity on your dime?
10. Shop around for telecommunications services.  Its time to stop thinking that you have to stay married to a major carrier because even though they are the most expensive choice, they provide the best service.  That myth does not hold water anymore.  There are plenty of small competitive local carriers (CLEC) that can provide you the same service at lower cost.

In summary, these kinds of implementations take guts and the time has come for us get some managerial fortitude and make some cost efficiency changes to your organization.  Forget about how a telecom cost efficiency project might expose that your company has been wasting precious money on telecommunications costs for years.  Good managers, courageous managers, qualified managers know that it’s never too late to implement telecom cost savings techniques and gain business cost efficiencies. I’m not asking you to be a hero, I’m simply asking you to do your job.

Meanwhile, the Internal Revenue Service has dropped its recommendation that one quarter of business

cell phone usage be taxable because this is their estimateof personal usage that goes on within businesses. IRS Commissioner DougShulman announced on January 8, 2010, that the agency would wait for Congress to pass legislation onthe issue.

There is an excellent article this month in Blackberry Central written by Susan Nunziata regarding the latest tax implications. In the article, She advises that the tax issue from the IRS on personal cell phones

continues and is far from settled. She gives some excellent real life examples and court rulings regarding how some companies and their employees are still being held accountable by the IRS for personal use of cell phones. The IRS rules are being misinterpreted and misapplied by some business organizations out there.

I wholeheartedly agree with her findings. From a professional telecommunications audit perspective, note that there are a lot of companies that don’t have a cell phone policy or enforce the use of business calls only for their employees (which would satisfy most IRS requirements on business use of cell phones).

Basically, the IRS wants individuals who use business cell phones for personal use to be to be taxed as a part of their income for personal use. They also want businesses to not claim those smart phones for depreciation and business use purposes. Congress wants consumers to have an easier time of managing the expense and make the taxation piece fair and easier to understand.

Nunziata’s article has some great points and goes on to discuss and illustrate the rules of employing cell phones at your company as follows:

1. Assess your existing policies for corporate issued smartphones, and require your employees to keep records of each call and its business purpose.

2. regularly audit smartphone records and require employees to reimburse your company for all personal use.

3. Consider whether an individual liable model is appropriate for the cell phone users in your company.

Again, I believe that most businesses are not doing this and are either unaware of the rule, or choose to ignore it! Nevertheless, we hope Congress is successful in making the IRS smart phone policy easier to adhere to and understand.

You can save money with a business cell phone bill audit or a cell phone policy written for your company. Contact the telecom audit pros at BottaBoom today or call 1-888-487-5326 for a free telephone bill audit review. If we find no telecom refunds or recurring savings, you owe us nothing!

About the author: You can learn more about this author at this link: Telecom Audit Professional

A company spokesman at BottaBoom Consulting LLC, a business telephone bill audit industry market leader says, “cell phone audit requests from business clients have risen 32% over the past 24 months and our revenues have significantly increased from the issues we’ve resolved in the wireless area.” This also reflects the general populations’ move to more wireless services, thus an increased need for an audit.

Recent media reports also show positive results for organizations that take the time to audit their cell phone users and wireless devices. We dug up a few recent eye opening stories from twitter posts that show the huge problems some public organizations and users are having with their cell phone accounts as follows:

San Antonio City Employee Fired for Racking up $5,200 Cell Bill for personal calls: http://tiny.cc/pNDnV

Some abuses found in county cell phone audit in county near Tampa Fla: http://tinyurl.com/ylmds2h

Recent cell phone audit for the State of Oregon shows over 450K in wasted telecom expense: http://tiny.cc/jNv6G

A study shows the average Illinois cell phone consumer could save an average of $331 on their wireless phone bills!http://tiny.cc/SG6t5

New Jersey State Medical University cell phone audit shows thousands wasted: http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2009/05/audit_finds_umdnj_spent_big_on.html

In summary, cell phone abuse and waste will continue to increase, as long as consumers continue to use more wireless devices. A great way to combat the problem and save huge expense for organizations is to commission a comprehensive cell phone audit.

We Can Help

Does your company need a business cell phone audit? Contact the phone bill audit experts today at http://www.bottaboom.com/contact-us/

You can read more telecom audit news on our twitter page at: http://twitter.com/bottaboom

About the author: You can learn more about this author at this link: Telecom Audit Professional

According to Nancy Cooper, a columnist for Inc. Magazine, “Employers can be liable for road accidents caused by worker cell phone use. A strict cell phone safety policy can help.” And Sates have different laws that address cell phone use while driving. Since many companies have locations in multiple states, it is advisable for them to institute a company-wide policy that discourages cell phone use while driving – across all geographies – period.

As a telecommunications consultant, I often write corporate cell phone policies for my clients. And the distracted driving problem is yet another great reason to have one in place. However, there are several other reasons that companies should have a comprehensive corporate wireless policy.

The Importance Of Cell Phone Safety

A good cell phone policy not only covers this kind of newer liability issue, it also covers many other legal and financial challenges that might cause you problems.

For instance, there is an IRS guideline that requires company cell phones and wireless data devices to be used only for business purposes; otherwise, personal use of these devices must be claimed as a taxable benefit. Your company could be penalized and audited for non-compliance of this rule.

Make sure there are provisions in your wireless policy for business and personal use. Should your employees be allowed to use your company’s cell phones in an emergency? Probably so; however, you must make it clear as a matter of policy what is allowed and what is not. A good cell phone policy will clearly show your managers and employees the companywide rules for wireless usage to avoid some managers making their own decisions.

Another problem that cell phone bill auditors see today is that of ownership of company cell phone numbers. This is a particularly thorny issue for companies that have personnel in critical sales jobs or employees who have cellular contact with key customers or enterprise accounts who take company cell phone numbers with them when they leave. Your policy should state that your company exclusively owns the phone numbers, not the employee. Why? If the employee leaves your company, many of your key customers may still be contacting them on that phone number (possibly at a new competing job) for similar goods and services! Believe me, this happens all the time, and it is a real problem.

Many employers simply reimburse their employees for business usage of the employees’ personal cell phones, without thinking about the critical company vehicle that the cell phone represents. Its loss could negatively impact your business. Therefore, I most often recommend that your cell phone policy should state that the cell phone and the number belong exclusively to the company and that the employee must turn in the equipment upon termination of employment.

Employees Should Be Aware

Employees should understand that cell phones and wireless data devices are controlled not by them, but by a company-authorized employee who is the only person authorized to order devices, assign plans, manage devices and the like. This will preclude complete chaos in tracking and prohibit employees from ordering whatever services they want.

Another cell phone issue is liability for damage. A good wireless policy also stipulates responsibility for lost or intentionally or accidentally damaged phones and how to report problems. This will prevent confusion and help keep costs under control.

Once you have a company cell phone policy in place, make sure you read and discuss it thoroughly with all of your new and current employees. Have them sign the policy to ensure that they understand the information contained within. Be sure to provide employees with a copy of the cell phone policy and include a statement in the language of the signed policy that the employee has been given a copy. This will help minimize your company’s liability for any legal issues that may arise. The cell phone policy should be a required part of your company’s new employee orientation.

We Can Help

Do you need a cell phone policy written for you or a cell phone bill audit performed for your company? Contact the telecommunications audit experts today.

In my 25 year experience as a cell phone bill audit professional, and from my telecom research, 99.9 percent of U.S. businesses that use wireless services do not need monthly cell phone insurance. So I urge you to strongly consider cutting wireless phone insurance from your budget and save some solid telecom expense today.

On average, the cell phone carriers are charging anywhere from $5-$6 per month per phone and making a killing on these charges, particularly for large companies who are forking this out each month. Add the premiums when you lose or break your cell phone, and there are even more costs. And, the headaches and filing claims with the cell-phone carrier is a huge time consuming and frustrating process.

It’s always cheaper to self-insure your wireless phones unless you have unusual kinds of usage or those users with butter fingers. We’ve seen janitorial and maintenance type of workers take the insurance because their cell phones get beat up a lot or dropped in water due to the nature of their work. But even then, the cell phone companies often won’t cover that type of damage if they open up the cell phone and its wet inside or clearly been abused. If you decide to keep the insurance, make sure you read the fine print on the cell phone insurance contract.

Our telecom audit company (BottaBoom) is so sure of advising our clients to cancel their cell phone insurance; we guarantee that we’ll cover half of the savings of the normal insurance costs if that threshold is exceeded once we actually cancel the insurance. In over 9 years of offering this savings guarantee, none of our clients out of several hundred have taken us up on the offer because they have not needed to. The cell phone carriers aren’t stupid, they’re making a killing on these insurance premiums.

If you want to measure the cost of going without cell phone insurance, take a look at your last 8 months’ worth of cell phone bills and/or ask your cell phone carrier to provide you with a report on past replaced phones for your company. Now compare that cost to what you are actually paying for 8 months of insurance on all of your cell phones and blackberries. Once you’ve determined your savings, show your boss the cost savings and get a huge pat on the back, or perhaps a nice raise or bonus! Saving money can be fun.

Also, make sure you have a corporate cell phone policy, particularly one that holds users accountable for damaged or lost phones. Another thing you can do is negotiate with your cell phone carrier for spare phones and replacements as part of the contract. The more cell phones your company has, the more leverage you will have in asking for this incentive from the cell phone provider.

Look for another cost savings article coming soon regarding wire protection insurance on your data and phone lines.

Research information and portions of this report were provided courtesy of The Voice Report, a state-of-the-art professional telecommunications management publication. You can sign up for a free trial at www.thevoicereport.com/FreeTrial. Once you sign up for log-in credentials, you can read more details and the whole piece on wireless insurance here: http://www.thevoicereport.com/2009-05-07/Insurance.

Get a free no risk telecom cost savings and telecom audit review for your business from BottaBoom today, contact the telecommunications audit experts here: http://www.bottaboom.com/contact-us/

In the telecom audit arena, I’ve seen the same kind of behavior by telecom executives as those depicted in the movie. Its all about greed. We as telecom audit professionals and telecom cost savings personnel, along with many business telecom consumers all know who they are. Those devious “smartest guys in the room” don’t work for Enron anymore, I think that they are the telecommunications carrier managers and attorneys for the top telecom carriers in the country who devise complicated yet binding legal contract billing methodology in order to maximize profits so that they can effectively gouge unsuspecting business telecom consumers to the tune of billions of dollars.  They are raking in billions of dollars in added revenue each year as a result.  As a telecom audit professional,  I see the real effects that these contractual nuances have on customer telecommunications bills.

As I work my share of multi-million dollar corporate telcom audits for BottaBoom Telecom Auditing, meticulously combing through the vast myriad of charges on phone bills and solving the complicated over-billing puzzles I encounter, I envision these people who devise telecom contract language and policy (the telecom carrier brain trusts) sitting in some conference room for hours and days at a time. Their greedy mission is to find all of the ways to tilt the zero sum game of telecom billing their way in their favor, to enhance their profitability and ensure that the business telecom consumer is squeezed for every last penny. And, I must say, when you closely examine their revenue enhancing tactics and the fine print of telecom contracts in detail, the terms are frighteningly brilliant and quite effective at legally allowing telecommunication companies to get away with legally gouging the typical business consumer.

Professional telecom auditors seem to be the only ones who can unlock the secrets of their greedy billing tactics and navigate through them. But I guess I should be grateful, If it wasn’t for these vast billing issues and their complicated legal nuances and protections to wade through and solve, I’d be out of work. But not only are professional telecom auditors the real heroes in all  of this, they are the most ethical and the ones who wear the white hats.  The telecom auditing profession requires meticulous sleuthing with a well-trained eye who possesses many years of technical telecommunications and auditing discipline to see through the muddy waters of telecom billing and pinpoint the areas of telecom expense waste for large US companies.  We have to outsmart the smartest guys in the room and often do.

At a recent cell phone bill audit project meeting, I had a high ranking Vice President of one of the big five cell phone carriers recently tell me with a straight face, “we really don’t want to present ourselves as being greedy or trying to lock our customers into unreasonable contract terms.” I retorted with, “you must be kidding me, that is exactly what your company does.” That is like Bernie Madoff saying he did not run a Ponzi Scheme! I went on to explain to this VP in detail all of the numerous billing scenarios and term commitment tactics used by his company against my client by his employees and management. Thereafter, he could not possibly defend his company. The contractual rules commitments of many cell phone providers and carriers are in place to trap companies and mandate that you stay with their shoddy cell phone service for years as paying phone prisoners and by legal obligation. There is often no real freedom of choice in today’s cell phone business because of how these deals are written and created by the phone companies.

I want to focus here on cell phone contracts. Let’s examine some of the unbelievably twisted billing tactics. What kinds of slimy tactics do we see on cell phone contracts? Here is an example of what I am talking about with one of the big five cell phone carriers that I recently encountered during a telecom audit:

The client signs an order that is presented to their company as a master agreement main umbrella service contract for all of their cell phones and blackberries. This commits the company for two years with the cell phone provider. But when we looked closely at the fine legal print of the contract that the smartest guys in the room dreamed up we found that if you don’t formally stop (terminate) the contract in two years, the contract automatically renews.

And, don’t think that this master agreement contract governs every move you make as a customer. For example, If you order new cell phone equipment from the carrier on one of your cell phones before the master agreement term is up, the new order commits you to an extra year or two of service, beyond that of your umbrella agreement. And, if you order from the carrier’s support center, this commitment is two years. However, if you order through your sales representative, it’s only one year. And remember, if you call in and place an order that is often legally binding even though you are not provided with the contractual terms when you place the order! Keep in mind that the cell phone carriers are covered legally for all of this behavior.

So all of this is really very confusing, so you flee to the carrier sales representative to clarify matters and help protect you and reassure you. But to further complicate matters, the representative explains time and again exactly what you want to hear, not to worry, they’ll handle everything, in two years you can walk away with no early termination fees. The reality is more often than not, you cannot walk, you are trapped and those phony verbal promises never existed because they’ll be denied later. Make sure, to get everything in writing or you’ll never be able to defeat the smartest guys in the room.

And, the issue of cell phone terms has Congress working on the problem as well.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9774874-7.html

I personally think cell phone carrier terms and conditions are the worst, but the cell phone carriers aren’t the only telecom providers to employ the smartest guy tactics enhance their billing revenue. Most long distance and local carriers do this as well. The most flagrant example I find of customer gouging is the minimum monthly revenue commitment scam and misrepresentation of contracts. I’m not talking about a $10 or !5
usage commitment on a small phone bill. I am talking about $1,000 to $10,000,000 and higher usage commitments to carriers and their unreasonable penalties. If you exceed the commitments, the carrier gets paid the extra revenue. If you fall short, you pay a penalty. And it’s all perfectly legal and contained in the fine print. Is that really fair? No. Does this generate a ton of additional revenue for the telephone companies? Yes.

As we wade through all of the contractual jargon and rules, we’ve come to appreciate those that have created them, because they are so effective. Moreover, they actually play into the hands of some telecom carrier sales reps. Ever heard of the bait and switch swindle? It happens in telecommunications contracts, more than you might think. But that is another article for another day.

If you are such a customer who is frustrated by all of the red tape and tactics employed by the carriers and inflicted by the smartest guys in the room, consider a professional telecommunications billing advocate like BottaBoom to fight for you. As phone company business customers continue to grow angrier and get ripped off by unscrupulous telecoms, I see more class action suits to combat and get justice for these blatant and unethical contract and billing tactics.

Click here to contact the business phone bill audit and telecom cost savings experts.

1. Check internet usage and text messaging charges for each cell phone user. Make sure that your employees are authorized to have internet access and if they do, most should have unlimited texting if the exceed a certain amount–check with your wireless carrier. Each data user needs to use those services responsibly and have the most appropriate pricing package for those services and know what the limitations are. Texting is a valuable business tool and we’ve seen hundreds of dollars in cell phone texting charges that could have been prevented by putting text happy employees on a $5 per month plan for unlimited texting. If you don’t want your employees texting, eliminate that capability on their cell phones.

2. Each month, look for cell phone usage minute overage charges, roaming charges, and billed features of each user on the cell phone bill. Online cell phone billing platforms from the carriers enable you to run reports on these items to help you filter vast amounts of data to get to the golden savings. Use the online billing tools and reports, they’re often free and easy to navigate.

3. Check pooling of minutes: Change calling habits of your cell phone users.   If we see lot of calls to a person on a land line telephone from one of our cell phone users that has free mobile to mobile minutes (MTM), we would look to change their calling habits or perhaps make sure the person at the other end of the land line has a cell phone on our plan with free mobile to mobile minutes. When a call is made to a land line telephone from a cell phone, it is charged against pooled minutes, often causing overages which cost you a lot of money. Mobile to mobile calls often do not eat up your peak minutes, so make sure your take advantage of free minutes, not using up your precious costed, pooled or peak minutes that count against your normal usage minutes.

Tip: You heard it here first: You can also ask your cell phone carrier to exclude certain frequently dialed numbers that you call from your cell phone.  This will cut your peak minute allocations and very often the cell phone company will accommodate this.  In fact, Verizon wireless has a recent promotion giving business users 10 of their top ten dialed numbers with unlimited cell phone minutes.

4. Check directory assistance charges.  If someone is making a lot of directory assistance (411 information calls) on their cell phone, we’ll suggest that they instead use a discount directory assistance vendor or restrict their calling to specially dialed free 411 services from their cellphones. Users can also use their office pcs or blackberries to look up directory service information (if they have an unlimited data plan), it is a lot cheaper than paying 411 service. So beware, cell phones can incur directory assistance charges as high as $2.50 per directory assistance inquiry! For large companies, this can be a huge expense each month and very often, employees actually think its free to their company, but carrier directly assistance service is not free.

5. New wireless equipment not discounted: We often find that cell phones and blackberries do not always get the correct discount as per corporate cell phone contract, check those discounts and get your refunds.

Do you like what you are reading?  How about a cell phone bill audit for your business or organization? Get in touch with the cell phone auditing experts today at http://www.bottaboom.com/contact-us/

6. Cancel unused cell phones.  Unused and underutilized phones should be reviewed for removal. As soon as an employee is terminated their cell phone should either be assigned to a new user or given to someone to monitor it or taken out of service, depending on the situation. If you have a sales team, if possible, make sure that you issue the cell phone and the number from your company, think twice about reimbursing them for their personal cell phone usage that they use on business, otherwise, the sales person takes that cell phone and number (a valuable asset) to their next job if they leave, perhaps your competitor gets the future sale by your client simply calling your former sales rep on their cell phone with their next order through your competitor. This is a very real issue that we come across and it is something to consider.

7.  Take advantage of the latest cell phone pricing plans. Cell phone and blackberry device prices are constantly going down in the wireless phone industry, not up. We take advantage of the downtrend in pricing by checking on new cell phone plan promotions every month or two.

8. Institute and have your employees adhere to a strict company cell phone policy. Make employees aware of the kinds of cell phone plan you are on and educate them how they should most efficiently utilize the wireless plan and equipment that you provide.  Demonstrate expectations of cell phone usage and have them sign a cell phone policy agreement.

9. Use the correct and most cost effective calling service: Employee callers who call your company with their cell phones should consider using a landline phone to dial the toll-free number to save on cell minutes or use the cell phone mobile to mobile to save on toll-free costs as applicable. If you are incurring billing to your company, bill on one telecom service by using the landline or the cell phone connection, not two services that will be billed to you.

10. Cramming:  Look out for cell phone cramming or premium service charges. Cramming has been around for years on landline telephone bills, however, this phenomenon and nuisance is becoming a huge problem for corporate mobile phone users. These are 3rd party charges placed on your cell phone accounts by overzealous 3rd party billers. The cell phone audit will pick these charges up immediately. They include but are not limited to, GPS services, holographs, screen savers, games, music, ringtones and a myriad of other services you and your users never ordered or remember ordering.  Like local and long distance  phone bill cramming, They’re often buried in the bill and difficult to detect and decipher.

11. Default costed features on new phones:  When you order and receive a new cell phone, you are often automatically granted internet access by the carrier by default. This is particularly true with AT&T wireless. Your new cell phone user plays around with his phone (new toy) and connects to the internet…a lot. They may be thinking, “wow my old cell phone would not let me connect to the internet but the new one does and I can google as much as I want!” Stop right there! No you cannot connect to the internet as much as you want without paying a huge cost!
Be ready for sticker shock, next month’s cell phone bill will show a huge per kilobyte charges for internet access and this can go on for months with huge charges unless you discover and stop it. You should call the carrier and they’ll explain that the new phones come with internet access as a default. This is not right and you don’t have to take this because you did not specifically order internet access! Time to demand a refund. With the reliable carriers, they know the problem and they should refund you immediately with no questions asked.

Our current national business cell phone carrier rankings (2009) are as follows based on our experience for best competitive pricing and service is currently ranked as follows:
Number 1: Sprint
Best Pricing
Number 2: Verizon Wireless
Best Service
Number 3: AT&T Wireless
Good Pricing and Service
Number 4: Nextel Wireless
Good pricing and service
Number 5: T-Mobile

Good pricing with below average sales support

Cell Phone Industry Termination Fees

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