Business Long Distance

Great post on 6  traps websites may set for you when shopping for business long distance phone service.

1. Watch out for billing tricks.  Ask what is the billing increment the carrier will use?

Many times a $.03 rate will be closer to $.05 or even higher because of their billing tricks. Instead of the standard 18/6 billing, they’ll round up your call in 30 or 60 second increment.

What this means to you is… if you’re on a call for 1 minute and 5 seconds, they’ll round up your call to either 1 minute and 30 seconds or 2 minutes. As you can see, this can easily raise your bill by 50-95%. I’ve seen the horror stories of this shady practice.

2. Beware of sites that show a listing of carriers and their rates.

Not only can you fall victim to the 60 second billing trick, you’ll still have to contact all the carriers yourself to determine the best rate plan for your business. And this can be very time consuming.

These sites aim to confuse you with their gimmicky rate calculators hoping you won’t do your homework and just choose what looks best.

But as you know, what looks best isn’t always the case. These sites serve one purpose, to make a referral commission off you. They’re not their job to help you in choosing the best plan for your business.

Also, these sites represent resellers and not long distance carriers you are more familiar with, such as AT&T, Qwest, Sprint and Verizon. This can be advantageous but you have to do your homework. If a reseller goes out of business that means your long distance service is out of business, too.

If your long distance isn’t important for you, then it won’t matter which carrier you choose but if it’s important to you, then you need expert advice in choosing the best and most stable carrier.