Flexible working policies and a business’ approach to implementing them, have been thrust to the top of boardroom agendas in the last couple of months and businesses are realising the importance of ensuring employees have access to the resources and infrastructure support working remotely. Not only that, but COVID’s effect on e-commerce, cybersecurity and yes, even billing, has been significant.
Many will say that the long-term effects are still too far away to know, and that’s true. But we can look at the impression COVID-19 has already had on the market in the last four months, speculate on the behaviours we’re already seeing, and project them into the future to give us a more realistic expectation of the impact that the coronavirus will have across the UK telecoms industry.
How has billing changed?
Primarily, the amount of data used across the United Kingdom has already increased significantly and as more businesses implement remote working policies, that increase is only going to grow further. The Government’s plans to supply gigabit-capable connections across the UK to homes and businesses by 2025 now seems far more essential than it did last year and long-asked questions about whether internet access should be considered and treated as ‘the fourth utility’ are going to be asked more often and louder than ever before.
While most ISPs and wholesalers have removed data speed and usage limits for customers, the data must still be billed, even if for free, and cloud-based platforms like ZOEY prove their purpose with its Cloud-based portal, ideal for remote access by homeworkers.
What’s more, now that we’re all starting down the path of ‘returning to normal’, at some point in the near future those unlimited data caps are going to be removed and consumers and business alike will be subject to their previous limits. Quite possibly, this will occur before the nation’s usage drops to pre-COVID levels (if it is to drop at all) and this presents the possibility of a resurgence in over-usage.
How can Resellers maximise their margins in the post-COVID world?
With such slight margins in the Channel, Resellers need to ensure they’re not only maximising margins but removing the possibility of unbilled usage. ZOEY’s margin analysis suite can ensure that your team is identifying low-margin or loss-making usage and addressing it before invoice runs are completed.
Bolt-ons and value-added services are also significant revenue generators for the Channel. Whether its call recording, back-ups or auto-attendants, ZOEY’s intuitive user interface makes adding new services and allocating them to lines, super-simple, with only a few clicks.
Also, ZOEY’s end-user managed spend and data usage caps ensure that end-users only consume the data they’re allocated, preventing those awkward ‘Why is my bill so high this month?!’ conversations that we all dread.
Tekton is here to help support the Channel however it can, so if you’d like to discover a better way of billing your customers, please don’t hesitate to get in touch by calling 0203 972 3723 or booking a time to see ZOEY in action!
