Telecom Expense Management Can Help Lower Business Costs

Are there other ways of reducing your expenditures without affecting your personnel?

One of the largest expenses that a business may incur is their telecom expense. It is right up near the top of the list in many cases. If there were a way to reduce the amount of money spent on telecom without reducing the way you conduct business, would you be interested? Well, there is a way to manage your telecom expenses, and it is called telecom expense management.

Telecom expense management, or TEM, can help you control it all. Telecom can be a wild and unruly creature when left on its own, but with proper attention, it can be reigned in and massaged into a well-mannered part of your company. The problem with telecom – especially the wireless end of the spectrum – is that uncontrolled inventory, services, and “who has what device” costs you dearly.  The following are some of the critical components of an effective telecom expense management strategy.

  • Asset Management is essentially inventory control for wireless devices. The TEM team uses software to keep track of each device and who has it. It is successful only if some of the following aspects of TEM are utilized in conjunction with it.
  • E-Procurement. This is the process that controls how any new device is acquired, every exchange is documented, and all repairs are noted. It assures that only approved devices are obtained. This is accomplished by having a single, centralized point through which everything is approved and procured.
  • Invoice Validation. A research group found that up to 12% of all wireless service invoices contain errors, and 85% of those invoices are paid without question. It may be hard to believe, but a majority of the errors are in favor of the vendor and/or service provider.
  • Expense Optimization is just what it sounds like. The telecom expense management team ensures that you are getting the best deal for your telecom expense dollar. They are vendor-neutral, and will find the most cost-effective vendors and service providers for your business.
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Saving Technology Costs with Wireless Expense Management

Companies today are always looking for ways to save money and one such solution is wireless expense management. It is well documented that telecom expenses are often near the top of the list of expenses for businesses.  Finding savings wherever you can is important in today’s current economy so reducing wasteful spending might mean the difference in what color ink you use to write your bottom line.  Telecom expense management (TEM) deals with reducing the waste and inefficiency that is inherent within an uncontrolled telecom system.  Telecom expense management has a cousin called wireless expense management (WEM).  WEM is concerned only with your wireless expenditures, while TEM takes in everything else including your hard-wired phone system. You probably need one or the other, but the focus of this article is on wireless expense management.

Research has discovered that anywhere from 7% to 12% of wireless telecom invoices have errors, and those errors over time can have a huge impact on your company’s profit margin.  Did you know that a vast majority of those errors were in favor of the vendor/service provider?  Did you know that 85% of those invoices were paid without question?  Wouldn’t it be great if you could recover those dollars?  A wireless expense management company can do that for you.  Generally, wireless expense management companies work on a percentage basis, and therefore they have an incentive to do their best to save money for your company.  Invoice validation doesn’t cost … it pays.

Finding a wireless expense management company is easy.  Finding a reputable one that covers every angle of WEM isn’t quite so simple, but by spending some time researching wireless expense management firms online you will find the right company you can depend on for your WEM needs.  A good company will have a seasoned leadership team that will audit, negotiate, and act on your behalf to save you money, and they will also offer you a free communications expense audit.