Here are the main reasons why you should employ Telecom Expense Management (TEM) in your organization.

• TEM recovers the money that you have lost as telecom expenses because of errors in billing and accounting.
• It introduces measures to manage your telecom expenses efficiently, thereby saving you more money.
• TEM releases the resources who are managing your telecom expenses for other priority work, thereby helping your organization increase its utilization.
• It tracks down any unlawful practices by your telecom vendor and stops them. Your vendor may intentionally (slamming) or unintentionally add services to your plan that you never asked for.
• TEM automates invoice processing.
• It tracks instances of misuse, overuse, and abuse of the telecom services.
• TEM is typically paid for on a contingency basis.

Management of telecom expenses is important, and a professional team manages them effectively. You may think that you can handle the expenses on your own, but you will be surprised to find out that there are several areas that are not looked into for expense reduction. Take, for example, the errors in billing. It is only when a bill is flagged that most organizations look into the bills. More often than not, their audits are limited to the problem area, ignoring several other factors that may be contributing to the problem.

If you want to reduce your organization’s telecom expenses, go for TEM which is a complete package. However, make sure you hire a good telecom management company for the task.

Telecom expenses form a large part of a business’ expenses. Reducing these expenses will help it raise its profits. The recession introduced the world to a new kind of expense reduction: ‘cost-cutting’. The term has lost its honor in the current times. Telecom expense reduction need not be done by adopting these ‘cost-cutting’ measures but by sensible, practical ways. Let me explain what I am talking about.

We need to start right. A bad vendor or a bad plan will make us incur more expenses in spite of all the expense reduction measures you take. Don’t go for a vendor or a plan just because someone else too has opted for it. Find out what your telecom needs are, see if the vendor’s services align with them. Compare different vendors and plans before making that final decision.

My next point is similar to the infamous ‘cost-cutting’. Start monitoring the usage. You may never need to implement monstrous privilege-curbing measures to reduce expenses if you make sure the telecom services are not being misused or abused. And if the business’ legitimate usage is high, find another plan!

Start looking at your bills. Look at the previous ones as well. You will be surprised to find how many errors you have ignored in the past and how they have become a regular feature in your bills. You will actually be able to recover lost money if you start reviewing your bills properly.

Keep a lookout for problems in the telecom services and their unavailability. You have to get optimum service from the telecom services, not compromise.

Make sure you keep revisiting your telecom needs and the services to see they align. You have to go for a different plan as your needs grow.

This is the simplest plan for reducing telecom expenses.

Because a telecom management company will save you much more than you can save on telecom expenses on your own.

Expense management invariably involves an audit. But when we manage expenses on our own, we often ignore conducting proper audits. We depend largely on cutting down costs by curbing usage. And this is also a big deal. The reason I recommend outsourcing the expense management of your telecom network is simple: You focus on your business and let the professionals take care of expense reduction for you.

Outsourcing is really a good idea when it comes to managing your telecom expenses. I know what you are thinking: You will end up spending a fortune on trying to reduce expenses. Well, that would definitely be a paradox. But no, professional management is not expensive. In fact, it will cost you on a contingency basis, taking its payment from the savings it realizes for you. Oh, did I not mention it? Professional telecom expense management looks not only at reducing your expenses but also at recovering costs that you have incurred earlier.

The telecom industry has made telecom expense management a standard system. The system of Telecom Expense Management (TEM) retains its essence in its name but is popularly referred to by its acronym. Now, TEM is essentially what you get when you outsource your expense management.

TEM includes auditing, usage management, bill review etc. It brings in automation in areas such as invoice processing. TEM really makes your life simpler by letting you concentrate on your core business. If you haven’t deployed TEM in your organization yet, start looking for good telecom consultants.

When I see people talking over the cell phone everywhere – on streets, in restaurants, in cars, while buying groceries, while walking on the pavement – I wonder if their companies are paying their bills. And guess what? Most of their companies are.

Now, why does an organization provide its employees with wireless devices? To help its business. Some people definitely don’t use these privileges only for professional reasons. And with so many wireless devices across cities, states, even countries, it becomes difficult to manage these devices. And wireless expense management becomes a far-fetched idea.

Let’s look at what an organization needs to do in order to manage its wireless expenses.

• Tracking of usage: You have to begin by tracking each and every wireless device in your organization. You should know its type and its location. Next, track how it is being used. You should be able to tell if the services are being misused or abused.
• Review of current contract: Take time to look at your existing wireless contract again. Revisit the wireless services and plans and find out if they align with your organization’s wireless needs. If they don’t, it’s time you changed your vendor or plan.
• Review of bills: Look at what you are paying for the wireless services. Review the previous and the existing bills and see if there are errors. Sometimes, a consistent error becomes a feature of the bill. Make sure you study the bills carefully.

Continue tracking the usage and expenses regularly. Also, review your telecom needs periodically. If wireless management is too complicated for you to handle, hire a telecom management team.

Most of us crib about rising expenses at home but do nothing about it. And I am referring to any kind of expense. Often, we don’t even monitor the expenses, let alone trying to reduce them. In an organization, the absence of expense management can prove fatal. While organizations look at most of their expenses, some of them fail to look at their telecom expenses. The area is ignored because businesses make the following assumptions:

• The expenses are directly proportional to the services being used.
• The bills give us the right figure on what we should pay.

Now, let me tell you the problem with these assumptions.

• The expenses don’t necessarily reflect the usage. You have to understand the usage to know if you are spending right.
• The bills are not sacrosanct. They need a close review to find out if there are errors. The vendor may not be making intentional errors, but you are paying for any kind of errors in the bills.

I recommend a thorough, professional management of your telecom expenses. And there is nothing better than the widely accepted Telecom Expense Management (TEM). TEM reviews previous and current bills and finds out if you have been paying more than you should. It also ensures that you pay for only those services that you use and not for the ones that have been added to your telecom plan. TEM also helps you track the usage of the services. You get an idea if there is a misuse or over-use of the telecom services.

TEM focuses on recovering costs and reducing future expenses. Going for an expense management system for your telecom network will help you make bigger profits.

People often argue over what is the best method of managing telecom expenses. Their arguments and discussions ensue because they understand the importance of the management of telecom expenses. Do you understand it too, or are you in the habit of paying bills and not looking at either the expenses or the usage? If you don’t care about the importance of looking at your telecom expenses, it’s high time you understand why you need to.

The management of telecom expenses is so important that a term, Telecom Expense Management (TEM), has been coined for the best practices. Today, I will highlight four major benefits of the management of telecom expenses.

• You may have not realized it but you may have lost a lot of money because of errors in the accounting and billing of your telecom services. Expense management helps you recover the lost money.
• Expense management of your telecom services helps you figure out the service and plan that suits your telecom needs the best.
• While managing your telecom expenses, you will unearth instance of misuse, over-use, and abuse of your business’ telecom services.
• Strategic planning becomes easier with a well-planned telecom expense management. You will be able to foresee your future telecom needs and plan accordingly.

If you would like optimum benefits of expense management, go for professional TEM. And no, it doesn’t cost a fortune! You’ll pay a portion of what you get to save. Isn’t that enticing? Check our previous posts on TEM and you’ll understand why we keep harping on it.

I cannot live without my cell phone. Can you? There was a time when owning a mobile phone made you exceptional. Now, the absence of one will. Organizations no longer depend on static networks and devices. Mobility is not just in vogue but extremely necessary if you want to be in the race. The perceived complexity of managing a wireless network, however, deters organizations from going wireless.

The businesses who acquire the wireless network constantly worry about the increasing expenses and are confused about ways to manage them. What can you do to manage the expenses of a wireless network?

Start with tracking the usage of the telecom services. Even before you begin looking at the expenses, you have to know the number of devices being used, their types, the number of users, their locations, and the difference of plans, if any, among other things. Find out if there is any misuse of these services. Find out if your current usage exceeds the estimated usage significantly.

If your usage is beyond what you estimated it to be, you may not have analyzed your telecom needs properly. You have to revisit your needs and find out the source of the problem. If at all the problem is in the usage, you have to monitor it and control it to reduce your wireless expenses.

Apart from the needs and the usage, something else you need to review are your bills. Even if your bills are consistent, study them. Look at both the old and the current bills and find out if you are paying for services you never use or are being billed for a service that you canceled ages ago.

Managing the telecom network and its expenses become difficult in the absence of expertise. Hiring the services of a professional team may be a better idea if you are not equipped with the requisite knowledge.

Why is it that we look at cutting costs only when we are faced with a crisis? This recession opened our eyes to some innovative ways to cut costs. Barring layoffs and salary cuts, there are several other areas where we can reduce expenses. One significant area is the telecom area. Most organizations today depend largely on their telecom services for their day-to-day functioning. If we cut costs in this area, we’ll be able to save a lot of money.

Reduction of telecom expenses, however, needs to be taken up proactively, not as a consequence of enormous bills. Let’s look at some of the ways to reduce these expenses.

• Procurement: Get the best telecom vendor and service. Look at what your business’ needs are, and then, look at different vendors and their service plans to see which one suits your needs the best.
• Usage management: You should know that your business is using the telecom services judiciously. Find out if the services are being over-used or misused. If the services are legitimately being over-used, you should look for another plan.
• Bill auditing: Make sure you have a dedicated team to check the bills for errors. Also, make sure that you are not paying for services that you never use.
• Regular monitoring: Your telecom needs may change after some time, making your current service non-advantageous. You should keep analyzing your business’ telecom needs from time to time, and see if the service still suits you.

Getting a professional team to deploy Telecom Expense Management (TEM) in you organization will help you reduce telecom costs significantly.

Managing expenses is difficult, irrespective of the kind. The expenses of an organization become all the more difficult given the proportions of people, infrastructure etc. Now, imagine managing the expenses of something that very few understand – the telecom network. Now, how would you approach managing the telecom services of an enterprise? Common sense says that you will go for the best plan, ensure that usage is restricted to what is needed, and get optimum benefits of the telecom services.

You would think that all organizations approach the management of telecom expenses this way. That’s pragmatic, isn’t it? Most businesses will tell you that is how they manage their expenses, but if you ask them if they are happy with the results or if they have been able to optimize the telecom services, you will catch them thinking. Internal management of the telecom expenses is not always the best management, not because the intention is not right but because organizations are not equipped with the technical and the managerial know-how to handle their telecommunications.

What organizations need is a structured approach to the management of their telecom-related expenses. Telecom Expense Management (TEM) is one such structured approach that has gained favors with several organizations and telecom consultants. TEM has proven to realize significant savings for businesses.

TEM not only looks at reducing expenses and recovering costs but it also looks into other aspects of the telecom network such as procurement, inventory, invoicing, and usage. TEM encompasses auditing along with looking into other areas that contribute to increasing telecom expenses. Different consulting companies approach TEM differently but the intention is the same – to look into every aspect of the telecom network in order to bring down costs and optimize performance.

Telecom Expense Management (TEM) is catching up with many businesses but it is yet to become popular with all that thrive on telecom services. Organizations take some time to realize the value of structured management of telecom expenses. In one of our earlier posts, we discussed the business benefits of TEM. Its absence may prove costly and put your business at a risk. Let’s find out the problems that occur in the absence of TEM.

• Consistent errors in billing: An internal audit may catch one odd billing problem but it often fails to catch errors that have become consistent. Errors in billing and accounting cause you to pay heavily, literally.
• Vendor errors: Telecom vendors may not do this intentionally but they may charge you for services that you have already canceled. Also, at times, you may find yourself being billed for services that another company or individual. Such vendor errors are caused in the absence of clear communication between the vendor and the client.
• No track of usage: Your organizations’ telecom services are often misused for personal purposes. At times, you may even discover that your services are being used intentionally by other organizations to save costs. The absence of proper usage management increases telecom expenses unnecessarily.
• Unnecessary services: At times, phone vendors introduce additional services and surcharges that were not a part of the original contract. This practice is called slamming. The absence of TEM lets slamming go unnoticed.

Come back tomorrow for some insights into the world of telecom services.