Ideas to save money on your Telephone Bills.

While many business owners spend a lot of time examining the cost of Capital equipment in my opinion more stock should be put in regularly examining the amount spent on your operating costs, things like your Gas and Electricity.  Often by far the largest operating cost for utilities is your Telephone Bill.  This prompted me to put together a check list of five top tips which I believe will help any business reduce their Telephone Bill.

1.    Look at the Telephone numbers listed on your bill.  Time and time again I will sit down with a business to examine the bills and find that there are numbers listed on the bill which have not been used for years.  These could be lines that you used in the past that simply have been left behind as the business has evolved.  I went to see a company last week who had a charge being made for ISDN2, when we discussed this we found that the line had not been cancelled when the company had stopped using it when Broadband was released to the market.  This connection had been paid for for the last five and a half years, over this term the customer had spent over £1,500.  If you see a number you don’t recognise then call it and see if anybody answers it.  Be warned however, it may be your Burglar alarm line or a Broadband line!

2.    Think about the number of lines coming in to the business, are they all necessary?  You generally require one line for about three staff if you employ 10 or more people.  Do your ever hear the engaged tone when dialling out?  If not then you may be paying for lines that you are simply not using.  It is healthy to hear engaged occasionally as you know you have the balance right.  Of course if you hear it regularly or customers are complaining then this is an indicator that more lines are required.  If you are not sure if you have the balance right then there is software that can be attached to your lines to calculate this for you.

3.    Regularly review your call costs.  We all get lots of calls from companies trying to review you call costs, (even me!)  I am not suggesting you speak to all of them but it is good practice to review these costs on a regular basis.  I would suggest you set a date in your diary and re visit it every two years.

4.    Can you use Technology to work smarter?  As technology marches on and Broadband speeds increase we should all start to think about whether we can use these comparatively cheap services for other purposes.  By introducing SIP Trunks in to your business you can make significant reductions in you costs.  So what’s a SIP trunk I hear you ask?  In simple terms it is a Telephone line that is delivered over your Broadband connection.  Once delivered correctly in to the business it will perform in exactly the same way as a standard Telephone Line.  There are many benefits to this service, some of which I think I will keep for future blogs, however one of the keys here is the cost.  A standard line from BT will cost in the region of £13 to £18 per month while the cost of a SIP Trunk is around £7 per month.  There’s an easy way to half your rental costs!

5.    Always pay by Direct Debit.  I have lost count of the number of Telephone Bills from BT I have assessed that have a £9 charge added to them for the privilege of paying by cheque.  This is money wasted for no reason; keep it your own pocket!

Time spent examining these costs are rarely wasted.  We offer a free service to businesses to help in reducing these costs so if you just aren’t sure what you’re looking at then give us a call.

Jim