August 14, 2007 -- RadiusPoint announces the recovery of more than $180,000.00 for a mid-sized Manufacturer client. This recovery is in the form of a refund check and not a reduction to their invoices. The recovery stemmed from overcharges on a Managed Service contract.
Telecom vendors are crossing into the Telecom Expense Management (TEM) market space at a record pace. Many Telecom vendors must compete in other areas of the market due to consolidations and reduction of pricing that is lowering their profit margins. Several of the local and long distance service providers have developed an area called Managed Service contracts that are supposed to be the equivalent of the Telecom Expense Management (TEM) services. This type of engagement makes the chosen vendor responsible for providing the monthly service, billing and provisioning of new services.
This type of agreement will allow for a monthly fee for managing all moves, adds and changes plus gives a reduced rate on line and feature charges. The initial cost savings can appear to create a positive ROI benefit. However, for the RadiusPoint client the cost savings were hard for the client to identify and too time consuming to validate. The benefit of consolidating the invoices and vendors became a nightmare as the vendor made the billing even more ambiguous. To compound the problem, the local representative assigned to the account was reassigned due to the vendor’s merger. All knowledge of billing issues, from the vendor’s perspective, was lost and the client was forced to train the new representative. As time continued, the promises made in the managed service agreement faded.
This Manufacturing Company sought the advice of RadiusPoint and with their proprietary software, ExpenseLogic, invoices were short paid and overcharges were put into dispute with the vendor. Some credits started appearing on the invoice, however to confuse the billing further, as credits for errors were given, other suspicious charges were placed on the billing to offset the progress made. Only when RadiusPoint escalated and stressed that an FCC complaint would be filed if corrections were not made in a reasonable timeframe, did the vendor’s representative coordinate a billing team to resolve the problems. The entire process took approximately eight (8) months to correct and recover.
According to Gartner 2006 research, the overcharges from the telecom vendors are between 3% and 9% per month. The overcharges can range from the obvious, a number that does not belong to the client, to the obscure, a service mistakenly added to a client’s invoice. If the invoices are not analyzed in great detail each month, the Client stands to lose large sums each month in these errors. This is where the Client will gain its highest ROI by partnering with an independent Telecom Expense Management (TEM) provider. For a current list of Independent Telecom Expense Management providers visit www.itemassociation.org.
RadiusPoint provides a broad portfolio of business and technology expense management solutions to help its clients worldwide improve their business performance. Core services consist of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), Software as a Service (SaaS) and License Software with respect to Telecom, Utility, Energy and IT invoice and expenses. RadiusPoint follows ISO 9001:2000 processes and meets government regulated standards (Sarbanes Oxley) through SAS 70 certification. RadiusPoint’s United States Corporate Headquarters is based in Memphis, Tennessee with an International office in the World Trade Center in downtown Rotterdam, the Netherlands and an expansion office opening in Istanbul, Turkey.
For additional information, please contact:
Sharon Watkins
RadiusPoint
901-388-3106
swatkins@radiuspoint.com
www.radiuspoint.com
