Manual telecom audits, as opposed to TEM software, employ the knowledge of an auditor (or a team of auditors) who do a thorough search through all of your company’s telecom related bills in order to find billing errors and identify cost reduction opportunities.
Audits can generally take place every 12-18 months, with some audits offering an ongoing review of telecom expenses each month for the following 12 months after initial hire. Manual audits are meticulous and non-intrusive, allowing business to go on as usual without disruption.
When you consider that 80% of all telecom invoices contain billing errors, and that over 95% of invoices have services that aren’t needed, or aren’t billing at the best price point possible, the cost of the audit process is often outweighed by the savings realized.
What You Get From a Comprehensive Telecom Audit
- Expert review of every line item on your invoices
- Thorough comparison of charges to contract and billing tariffs
- Identification of any billing mistakes
- Identification of under-used (or unused) services
- Identification of any credits/refunds due from your carrier
- Complete inventory of all lines, circuits, wireless devices, and features, across the enterprise
- All services properly assigned to correct cost centers
- Understanding of all existing contracts, what commitments are, and when terms expire
- Development of a formal contract strategy
- New contracts entered which level the playing field regarding terms and conditions
- Thorough review of procurement policies for telecom-related orders (including disconnections)
- Suggestions for procurement policy revisions to eliminate potential breakpoints
- Blueprint for future vendor accountability reviews to insure proactive management of services
- Price points, correct billing, etc. so that corrections put into place stay correct moving forward
Audits are also very useful in helping you determine exactly what your telecom assets are – since most bills do not clearly spell this out. Audits identify billing mistakes (which are very common with telecom invoices), get bills corrected, and secure the maximum credit possible. A thorough audit will review all billing line items to determine if there are any features, lines, circuits, or other asset charges for services not being used (this is far more common than you would ever suspect).
An audit will further review all individual contracts to determine contract expiration dates and help devise or refine a formal contract strategy, as well as review current versus known best in class pricing to help reduce costs moving forward.
While the option to conduct an exhaustive, internal audit of your own is always on the table, many companies find that without a thorough understanding of every telecom related pricing point, plan, and add-on, the audit doesn’t work as expected. Many hours are invested only to produce underwhelming results.
While TEM is often employed in companies with a monthly telecom spend of over $50,000, a manual audit is desirable for larger companies as well as those with a significantly lower spend. In fact, the right audit partner will not only be thorough, independent, and have unparalleled industry expertise, they will also only charge you based on the amount of overall savings your company realizes, which makes it a perfect way to see a huge return without a risky investment.
Running a business isn’t easy, and a telecommunications audit can be a time consuming and thorough undertaking that many employees are not prepared to take on. A telecommunications audit is a great way to maximize telecom savings and to do so in a non-intrusive manner.
[author_bio username=”Ken” name=”yes”]
