Reza, Your assessment of what a Local Link is is correct. It's a value bundle, a synonym for a Business Line w/ certain features. If the customer's bill has 5 business lines and 5 local links, then that would equate to 10 lines. Does the bill itemize the WTN's for each of the 10 lines? Are there duplicates? Can you do a physical inventory of their lines and PBX? This could range from "a billing error" to "someone ordered (or forgot to cancel) something."
If the bill isn't detailed enough, request an ER (equipment record) report from Bell. I don't know if it still holds true, but Bell used to send an ER once a year on your anniversary of signing up. If the billing has been this way for many months, they may be able to dig back through old bills to find one. The most common form of over-billing occurs when you cancel something. The service gets terminated but the billing doesn't. Marc Carrafiello Datex > -----Original Message----- > From: Reza - Asterisk Enthusiast [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Tuesday, July 24, 2007 3:55 PM > To: Toronto Asterisk Business Group > Subject: [biz] Bell Ripping off clients? > > Ok.... we've just deployed some Asterisk services & got > referral of another > from the next door (client's competition) and they want the > same system. > > So here is what is happening -- > > First client (Originally not on a PBX system): > - 5 Telephone lines originally > - paying about $50/phone line (marked Business Line) > - Monthly bill for 5 phone lines ~ $250/month. > - Replaced entire service of bell with SIP trunking and now > service is > costing them less than half that. > > > Second client (well prospect) next door who saw what we did > (has a small > office PBX): > - I was quite stunned when I saw their phone bill > - They too have 5 bell lines ~$50/month/line (this was > marked Business > Line) > - Immediately below on the bill are 5 units of what is marked > as "Local Link > PBell" at ~ $50/Local Link. > - Now these guys are paying per month approx $500+ for their > 5 phone line > service. > > In other words -- the prospect is paying literally MORE than > double of our > first client. Annually they are paying more than $6,000 for > their phone > service. So this new opportunity is already a winner (in > principle) but I > want your 2 cents on this "Local Link". > > My 2 cents (for TAUG) to be quite blunt, is that this "Local Link" is > nothing but a business line packaged with features. That is: Call > Forwarding, Name/Number Display, callTransfer, 3 way calling, bla bla > bla. --- and is absolutely un-necessary if you have SIP > trunking and having > Asterisk to manage all these wonderful features. > > Your thoughts please before I actually go and say they were > being over > charged and/or present a cost savings analysis for them. > > Cheers! > Reza. > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
