South African enterprises make a lot of costly mistakes when signing up for broadband services. This is according to Steve Briggs, CEO of new telecoms service provider and consulting firm Arc Telecoms.
Briggs, a speaker at the upcoming ITWeb Broadband 2010 conference, says common mistakes include not treating voice and data services holistically. “In practice, this means that many businesses shop for their services in a piecemeal fashion, resulting in a multitude of different providers, and not leveraging any economies of scale.”
Briggs says local companies also fail to understand hidden prices and unforeseen charges, and don't ask the right questions about service levels. He says it is important to choose a service provider that can supply all the required services in a single, understandable package. There are key questions that need to be asked before signing up for a service, he adds.
One is 'what telecoms services do I actually need?' “A business needs to work out whether it is really sufficient to run its 30-person operation on ADSL. Similarly, a small start-up may not require high-speed fibre,” Briggs says.
Another question that should be asked is 'what is the total cost of ownership of my current infrastructure?' Briggs explains: “A business needs to calculate what it is really paying for all the telecoms services it is consuming. This includes Internet, voice, PBX and software. This is often surprisingly higher than most business owners imagine.
“You also need to add the support costs and any annual fees, not to mention the escalation clauses. Finally, the support costs for the infrastructure also need to be calculated.” Once this is determined, the company can compare the total cost to the cost of moving to a new provider.
When considering a telecoms service provider, a company should also consider the impact the move will have on internal staffing and support, says Briggs. Other questions to be considered may seem obvious, but may be overlooked anyway, he says.
These include whether the service provider is licensed, what SLAs are in place and the costs involved, the service provider's contract terms and billing cycles, and what recourse the customer has if the service provider fails to deliver.
Briggs will outline the various services and packages available on the local market during his talk at the ITWeb Broadband 2010 conference at The Forum in Bryanston on 5 and 6 October.
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