All telephone call providers are not the same. Some strive to genuinely help provide as many savings as possible thereby gathering long term happy customers, whilst others secure your business with big claims and hidden “extras” that mean even bigger bills.
This article explores some of the “tricks of the trade” that unscrupulous providers use in order to increase their profits and not reduce your costs.
Having read this, you will be armed with a few pertinent questions to ask potential providers when your call contract comes up for renewal and be able to detect the genuine provider from the “phoneys” !
1. Call Set Up Fee - An “extra” charge is added to each and every call, on top of the per minute cost within the call plan.
2. Minute and Penny Round up- Each call is either rounded up to the nearest minute (instead of a second) and/or the nearest penny on your bill.
3. Minimum Annual Expenditure - As part of a special “deal” from your current provider, you are enticed into a minimum call spend often far greater than your actual current usage and you pay 90% of any shortfall.
4. Unclear Billing Information – You are not able to analyse your bill and compare the costs with those promised.
5. Excess Mobile Costs - A variation on 1,2 and 4 above but applied to the more costly calls to different mobile network providers.
6. Promotional Pricing - Similar to the magician’s sleight of hand trick. Focus on one hand ( the low or free local or national calls ) whilst doing something “unseen” with the other ( huge increases on 08 and mobile numbers say ).
7. Automatic Roll Over - Not reminding you of your contract expiry date until it is too late for you to do anything about it.
So, there you have it. Seven Sins from Phoney Providers to make you keep paying more than you need to. Of course, the real sin will be not doing anything about this.
Why not check your latest call bill now to see where you stand with your current provider ? 90 % of businesses do not do this.
If you do not understand your current contract , and you will be in good company as most people do not, then talk with a genuine provider who you know will provide you with real cost reductions and great services.
For further details and advice for business owners contact me.
