I recently spent a great deal of time with our company’s account representatives for our mobile phone cariers, AT&T and T-Mobile. I learned some eye-opening, jaw-dropping yet simple tricks that will reduce our company’s monthly mobile phone bill by hundreds of dollars. The changes to make are simple little things that truly add up to a great deal of savings. Here are some ways that you can help your company reduce their monthly mobile phone bills by a significant amount by simply making a couple of minor changes in the way you use your company provided cell phone.
Directory Assistance (411)
Companies can save substantially if every employee uses Google directory assistance from their cell phone instead of calling 411 which charges for every call made that way. It’s approximately $1.79 plus airtime per 411 call made from a mobile device which adds up quickly if a company has many employees on their plan. It’s free to use Google directory assistance via text messaging for addresses and numbers. Simply save Google’s directory assistance number (466453) under contacts as Google. When sending a text to GOOGLE just enter the name of the business and city and state or zipcode. For example, Pizza Hut Atlanta, GA. Google will then immediately start sending you the contact information that matches your request.
Google also offers 1-800-Goog-411 (1-800-466-4411) as well for free information calling.
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There are several other similar free services, such as:
Microsoft’s TellMe 1-800-555-TELL (8355)
1-800-Free 411
411SMS
Try each one to see which one you like best.
Change your voicemail number
You can also save a great deal when it comes to checking voicemail on mobile devices. By default, you are charged whenever you check your voicemail because you are dialing a special phone number. In order to be able to check voicemail for free, all you have to do is change that voicemail number to your own cell phone number. Here are the instructions for Blackberry and non-blackberry cell phone users.
Blackberry Users
1. Open the phone application.
2. Click the wheel and go to Options.
3. Click on Voicemail and it will display your Access Number. Change it to your own number.
4. Go into your Address Book and add an entry for ‘Voice Mail’ and put in the access number from step 3 as one of the phone numbers for that contact (it doesn’t matter which phone number slot you put it in).
5. Go back into your phone app. Click the wheel and select ‘View Speed Dial List’.
6. Select the [1] spot (or wherever you want the speed dial for voicemail to go).
7. Click the wheel and select ‘New Speed Dial’ (or ‘Edit’ if there is already something in that slot).
8. Select the Voice Mail contact you created in step 4.
9. Save your changes to the speed dial list and go delete the Voice Mail contact. The phone number will be left in the speed dial list.
Non BB users
1. Save your own number in contacts under yourself such as voicemail or “name” Jane voicemail.
2. Call the saved contact name and do not push 1 or 123 to call voicemail.
3. Depending on device:
a. Find phone options in device
b. Go to voicemail number
c. Select menu – edit voicemail number from default +8####### to your own seven digit mobile number.
WiFi Whenever Possible
Thanks to exciting new devices like the iPhone and the Skype Phone, mobile phone cariers such as AT&T and T-Mobile are offering models with WiFi capabilities such as the Blackberry Curve.
This is a significant move because it now enables mobile users to save airtime minutes by using “free” WiFi hotspot connections instead! There’s even a way to setup the phone to automatically switch to WiFi mode whenever one is available without user intervention. Look for mobile devices with WiFi features to become extremely popular.
Every Minute Counts!
This tip is just a matter of changing a habit and just common sense. Whenever possible, do your best to make and return phone calls from an office landline instead of your mobile phone. This will save a great deal of minutes and thus reduce your phone bill.
Final Thoughts
These are just some tips and ideas that can help you and your company save substantially every month. There are other things you can do to save hordes of cash such as adding your users to a pool of minutes instead of letting them each expense their monthly phone bills individually. Mobile cariers are much more flexible these days when it comes to porting phone numbers from personal accounts to corporate accounts and back out to personal accounts again so there isn’t a valid reason why an employee couldn’t join the company plan anymore. It also allows you to phone usages and control any financial bleeding that is taking place in your monthly phone expenditures. Each mobile carier provides powerful online account systems that allow you to examine how you are using your phones and minutes.