|
|
The Accountability Factor
Knowing who placed a call to whom, the call's duration and cost, and whether employees are productive on the
job are only a few of the ways call accounting applications can be used to reduce telecom costs and show a timely,
viable ROI. Listed here are the features and benefits which bring about a 10% - 30% reduction in your overall telecom
expenses:
|
Employee Productivity
Analyzing how an employee spends time on the phone can measure productivity. Call accounting systems can be
used to provide managers with reports showing number of calls, types of calls, cost, average duration for each
person/station; evaluate calling patterns and calls completed per hour (useful for collection agents, customer
service agents, telemarketers and sales persons); monitor the number of incoming calls per hour to correctly estimate
the number of staff needed at the right time and at the least cost; verify the effectiveness of marketing efforts.
|
Traffic Analysis
Traffic Analysis is a good way to see if you are spending money needlessly. It allows you to monitor the efficiency
of your phone system by locating trunks with no calls; verify the correct routing of calls in order to achieve
cost effective routing; identify and provide documentation of down trunks and malfunctioning circuits in order
to obtain rebates from vendors; calculate Grade of Service and the probability of calls receiving busy signals;
report on traffic load to determine busiest hours; determine if you are over or under trunked; evaluate actual
traffic usage to negotiate better contracts with your carriers.
|
Cost Allocation
Cost allocation is used to hold departments, divisions or individuals accountable for usage and to ensure they
stay within budgets; charge back departments for phone costs based on their actual usage; save time and labor by
distributing telecom expenses by department and automatically post them to the G/L; employ your own corporate charging
strategy; bill for miscellaneous charges (cellular, calling cards, pagers, etc.); determine which departments,
projects, products are profitable and which aren't.
|
Phone System Diagnostics
Is the phone system working as well as it should? Are all the lines working? Are all the circuit packs working?
Call Accounting systems can tell you which lines you're getting no traffic on; provide for smarter calling (directory
assistance, use of private network, etc); zero in on specific problems using ad hoc reports for quick resolution;
optimize your network by figuring out which is the best combination of long distance carriers - as well as tell
you which line carried the 48 hour call to Germany.
|
Toll Fraud
Toll Fraud costs businesses billions of dollars per year according to the FCC. Repeated incoming call attempts
over a trunk can indicate hacker attempts to gain access to the switch in order to loop back through it for outgoing
call purposes. By using a call accounting system, you can identify suspicious calling patterns (i.e. long holding
times, surges in phone use, calls after business hours); sound alarms; and page employees in case of emergency.
|
Internal Phone Abuse
Internal Phone Abuse can be detected and prevented. Monitor 411 and Directory assistance calls; check for abuse
of incoming 800 calls from employees' friends and relatives; track illegal or suspicious destinations to the station
originating them; monitor production time spent on the phone. Legal departments can track employees suspected of
revealing confidential information to competitors, the news media, or headhunters.
|
Phone Bill Verification
Phone Bill Verification can help document and prove disputed charges. Was the bill you received from your long
distance carrier accurate? Mostly you'll find it isn't. Use your call accounting system to compare vendor bills
to anticipated cost levels; check the minutes you are being billed for; verify that local and long distance billing
complies with your contract.
|
Verification for Legal Matters
Call Verification for Legal Issues identifies special cases of telephone abuse which can be monitored in real
time, providing instant facts so that immediate action can be taken. These include obscene or sexual harassment
calls, bomb threats, 911 calls, calls from your employee to competitors. Call accounting systems provide proof
that a call took place.
|
| |
|
