In thirty plus years, I have seen lots of things when it comes to how telecom services get handled. These are the six things that seem to be repeated over and over on thousands of plans.
1. Buying the inside wiring coverage
The inside wiring plan sounds like something that should be very beneficial to the consumer. IT's NOT! If you read the fine print there are additional charges that will be incurred for just about everything they might do INSIDE. Basically you are paying for nothing.This is true for telcos and cable companies.
2. Unlimited Long Distance
If you use 1000 plus minutes of long distance every month, this is a fairly good deal. Let's face it, most folks don't use that much. I recently told a client, "you paid thirty five cents per minute for your long distance last month." The client replied . "No we have UNLIMITED long distance!" "Right", I said, "which costs ten ninety five a month and you used 31 minutes last month." I have also seen people put unlimited long distance on all lines, also not good.
3. Buying domains , email and web hosting from your service provider If you were never ever, ever going to change providers this would be ok, but the reality of today's environment says that at some point you will want to change. Moving these services away from your provider is painful and time consuming. It's designed to be that way. How can I say that? For example,AT&T uses a domain registrar in Melbourne Australia called Melbourne IT. The only way to communicate with Melbourne IT is via FAX to their local number in Australia. Could they make it any more difficult? Coming soon...... AT&T's new domain registrar, LUNAR IT!!!
4. Having more than six analog lines.
This is another one of those basic math story problems from grade school. Six business lines cost $50 each or $300 per month. The average T-1 now costs about $300 per month and can handle up to 23 voice channels. How many lines past six does it take to make a T-1 the better deal? This will be on the test later....:)
5. Packaging feature deals on all your lines. Packaging features is a great idea for businesses with one or two lines and regular phones. It's a terrible idea for anyone with a phone system and three or more lines. I have seen bills with six line plans that have features on all six lines. Do you really want three way calling and voice mail on your third rollover line?
6. Assuming that “customer service”doesn’t mean SALES.
Customer service calls are answered in the sales department. I am not saying that the people you talk to aren't nice people or that they are out to get you.They are sales people with quotas to make , families to feed and products to push. Never forget that. What is good for them may not always be what you need.
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