By Mellenie Runion , Marketing

TeleBright has entered into an Exclusive Patent License Agreement with TracPoint Wireless. The announcement is on the heels of the wireless industry’s 2006 spending statistics. Wireless communications have rapidly changed the face of telecom. TeleBright is on the innovation edge for its client’s survival with surging wireless costs. TeleBright has brought together an end-to-end management solution to build a fortress around its client’s budgets.  

PlanGuard™ is the patented technology that provides an automated monitoring system for mobile devices that sends a text alert before the user runs out of the plan’s included minutes. This proactive technology provides complete and timely insight into the account’s activities. TeleBright’s end-to-end solution includes the ManageRight® Wireless portal which manages the full lifecycle starting with policy development and enforcement, plan and device comparisons, procurement, asset management, invoice processing, and expense allocation. This system significantly reduces expenses and streamlines operational workflow.

One of the big four accounting firms has used the TeleBright web portal since 2003, serving thousands of their internal users. By simply linking the site to their intranet, employees can find and compare all the approved, contractually-discounted devices and plans. Purchases are made without delay, saving time and money. Their corporate wireless policy is built into the process and evident in every purchase. The technology enhancements for the ManageRight Wireless portal offer complete telecom lifecycle management in addition to the integration of ManageRight® Telecom Expense Management (TEM).

“Wireless spending is a major budget concern for everyone these days. Obtaining this exclusive license from TracPoint Wireless is vital for TeleBright to provide superior sole source solutions to our clients” said Chet Thaker, Chief Executive Officer of TeleBright. “The exclusive agreement will also assist other telecom wireless management companies to be introduced to our exceptional value.”  

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In our first two installments of this three part series we acknowledged the foundation elements in developing a corporate wireless policy:

• Procurement
• Acceptable Usage
• Measurement & Expense Control in Real-Time

We went on to discuss Procurement and Acceptable Usage in more detail – and today we will conclude with the final Wireless Policy element: Measurement & Expense Control in Real-Time.

 Measurement & Expense Control

With today’s rapidly changing mobile environment and the increase in productivity and collaboration wireless services offer, enterprise mobile proliferation will continue to accelerate.  Establishing a methodology to measure the use and expense associated with these devices will become crucial not only to manage the growing operational expense, but also as a measurement of Cost of Sale and subsequently Profit Margins.

In today’s “Immediate Access to Information” environment companies that wish to implement a Corporate Wireless Policy must institute standards for measurement and expense control. 

But how do you properly measure use and control expenses when the only way to monitor these elements is with the monthly receipt of the invoice – or more problematic – the receipt of individual expense reports?

Analyzing trending data is certainly one solution. Taking two to three months worth of usage and expenditure data and analyzing those fluctuations would provide a simplistic model to forecast expenditures and apply proactive control measures.

The problem again is time and resources. Most IT/Telecom departments are already too overburdened to develop this process, apply the analytics or even more demanding implement solutions plus measure their results. The results not based upon actual data but a trending model.

Most companies, based upon workload and unavailable resources fall into the typical enterprise “Telecom Trap” of simply renegotiating contracts as a way to control and reduce expenses – historically not the best policy.  I like the Airline Industry analogy: how well do you think the airlines would do if they decided to fix their costs for flights on an annual basis? Certainly there would be instances where the price based upon the previous year model presented positive results. But obviously, most of the time the airlines would not be maximizing their profit potential or selling out the flight if costs were too high.  So how can companies believe re-negotiating telecom costs annually is the best strategy?

The argument is the availability of real time data.  Airlines developed the “Blue” system that dynamically changes prices based upon seat availability and demand thus maximizing their profit potential for every aisle, window and middle seat.

Certainly if companies had access to real time data they could better control usage through policy development and reduce expenditures based upon actual need and demand of wireless services by individuals and across the enterprise. Learn more about PlanGuard.

In any case, measurement of your wireless usage is the only way to optimize your corporate policy in a way that does not affect productivity. Analyzing individual to enterprise effect of wireless expense (underutilization and over-utilization) is critical in controlling and reducing the continuing tidal increase of enterprise mobile costs. CEO's White Paper on ECPM.

To summarize, it is imperative in today’s telecom environment to establish, implement and continually monitor your company’s wireless policy. As wireless requirements increase and access to real-time information drive business and differentiate competition demands will rise for wireless services.  Companies that do not have a policy or a valid structure will incur high expense and cannibalize their profit margins.

View this entire series. For assistance and a step by step guide on wireless policy development, we offer a RISK FREE wireless expenditure assessment and a custom policy outline for your business, contact Scott Jonasz at 301-296-3861 or by email (sjonasz@telebright.com) for more information.

Offering Evolved, Enabled, and Empowered Wireless and Wireless Management software and services.  TeleBright’s software platforms are empowered with BrightCare, the market's only proactive alert platform that monitors your telecom environment in real-time and notifies you via your chosen media when issues or opportunities present themselves. 

Affordable monthly licensing. Guaranteed ROI. Expense Conveyance Programs.

By Ron Friday , Vice President Business Development

Every year, businesses waste $10s of millions on telecommunications services.  Why do I say waste?  Because this spending goes to services that are not even being used by the company that is paying for them!  This scenario is far more common than you might believe, and is not limited to huge companies who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars per month.  Even businesses spending just a few thousand dollars per month will likely find this to be the case. 

How does this happen?  There are several scenarios that can cause this situation to arise.  One of the most common is when a customer contacts their provider to cancel a specific service – be it a business line, PRI, Private Line circuit, etc, but never checks to ensure that the billing has also been stopped.  Another very common situation is when a service is no longer needed, but the provider has not been contacted to cancel it.  If you have negotiated a custom priced deal with your provider, not all of your services may be getting billed at your special rates.  Typically it is up to someone to manually enter a special code on your order for the rates to appear, and this doesn't’t always happen as it should.  Over time, office sites will grow and shrink, along with needs for data bandwidth.  Many times re-optimizing bandwidth requirements is completely overlooked, and locations can become significantly overbuilt in comparison to their actual needs.  Over time, all of these situations can really start to add up.  If fact, when TeleBright audits a customer’s invoices and services, we will typically find almost 30% of their spending is going towards services that they either don’t use, or are inefficiently configured!

So what can you do about this?  The first thing is to perform regular audits of not only your invoices, but also your actual service needs.  These audits can be performed either by yourselves or with the assistance of a reputable firm like TeleBright – but don’t rely on your provider to do it for you!  Once you have established an appropriate baseline, you then need to ensure that you have tight linkage between those who are authorized to order services, and those who are responsible for the bills; otherwise the problems will begin all over again.  For this part, you may want to consider using technology to your advantage.  A program like ManageRight will automatically keep tabs on your spending month over month, and point out anomalies to you.  It can also centralize ordering, changing and moving services in order to facilitate control over your network.  Employing each of these steps into your business practices can greatly minimize your risk of overpaying for telecom services.

Oh, and one final thought.  Don’t think that these issues are only limited to business customers.  Often times your home cable and/or phone providers will roll out new, lower pricing on services you are currently buying.  But you don’t automatically get these rates, instead you have to call up and request them.  This is particularly true of high-speed internet access where bandwidth has been increasing and price has been decreasing.  Check your provider’s web sites to see if there might be money you can save too!

It seems easy enough, you turn off your cell phone when you go into a business meeting. Somehow this rule must not apply to the majority of people. It’s basic phone etiquette.

It’s unprofessional and rude to take a call of any type during a business meeting. Calls during business meetings disrupt everyone. It’s the equivalent of someone walking into a meeting and just starting a conversation while someone else is in mid sentence. Everyone’s time is valuable. Don’t forget, if you leave your phone outside of the meeting turn off your ringer, you won’t be able to hear it but someone will.

If visiting a new location follow the cell phone rules that are present or posted. If they say you should turn your cell phone off, turn it off.

If you are having problems at your office, post a rule for phones at the door. It seems elementary but if you’ve been in a large group meeting lately, you know that it is necessary.

When you are on the phone in public use normal volume by speaking into the phone. Try to keep some space between you and those around you. This is for your own privacy as well as the privacy of the person you are speaking with. It's also sensitive and respectful to those around you.