As another year begins the thoughts of many will be turning towards shedding a few pounds after the excesses of the festive period. Gym membership, and more importantly attendance, increase dramatically in January as New Year’s resolutions and ill fitting clothes drive many to strict measures. However, even with deals on offer to entice people to join, membership fees can be high and contracts not ideally suited to the individuals needs, specifically those of the ‘January Joiner’ (a phrase coined to describe those people who join the gym in January but by February have abandoned it in favour of their pre-Christmas lifestyle; wasting a good deal of money as a result).
The management of company finances, particularly in a period of financial instability has its similarities; you are driven by a need to streamline but want to avoid making too many significant changes, incurring any additional costs or commencing activities that demand too much time and may be difficult to manage and maintain.
Even if your financial calendar is not aligned to the traditional April to March cycle, the New Year still traditionally symbolises a time for review: whether to make a final push in the last quarter or to start new programmes of activity targeted with generating profitability or stimulating customer satisfaction. With IT budgets set for growth of 0% or less this year, Gartner predict that 2010 will be focused on ‘balancing the focus on cost, risk and growth’ and there would only be a slow improvement in 2011.
Simple steps can be taken that will deliver short term results as well as enabling long term efficiencies by ensuring your telecoms bills are an accurate reflection of products and services deployed. Comprehensive analysis of the total telecoms spend for the entire estate could reveal savings from under-utilised lines, incorrectly applied discount schemes, erroneous charges on historical bills as well as opportunities for improvements to existing installations, most without the need to change suppliers.
In addition, one of the continued ‘problem’ areas for those managing the telecoms budget is the level of variable cost that can be associated with mobility. Although mobile penetration is greater than 100% due to the multiple handset ownership statistics, the use of the corporate mobile for non business related activities needs to be monitored, irrespective of your policy regarding personal usage.
Mobile activity is prolific and even the more basic functions of SMS and MMS persistently make the headlines. This New Year’s eve saw record breaking numbers of text and picture messages sent across Europe with two UK operators alone reporting figures in the region of 348m during the 24 hour period for 31st December 2009. (Orange 121m and O2 227m).
Add to this the use of mobile handsets for micro purchases such as travel tickets, charitable donations, online media subscriptions and vending purchases and any claims against the whole mobile bill for tax purposes could result in an erroneous tax return and potentially incur a fine.
Whether working with a TCM specialist or undertaking the review with in-house expertise, the analysis of your telecoms expenditure could ensure the next quarter’s financial report for your organisation is in a much healthier position.
