5 telecom contract considerations

Photo courtesy of pixabay user delphinmedia

Photo courtesy of pixabay user delphinmedia

I always wonder why business owners object to signing a telecom contract. Is it because they don’t like to sign contracts??? Maybe. But, odds are they have already signed half a dozen already. Ever bought a house? Ever refinanced a mortgage? Ever had a gym membership or even gotten married? Well guess what? Those are all contracts. So what’s the issue of having one more?

Telecom contracts are not only a good thing, they are a necessity. Here are five common issues to consider before you sign your next telecom contract. Addressing these issues before you sign on the dotted line can help you vastly improve your business operations.

1. Long term agreements
Don’t get locked into something for longer than five years. Technology changes so quickly that you don’t want to be left behind. Most agreements are 36 months to 60 month. Make sure that you understand the term of the agreement before entering into it.

2. No “out” clause
A powerful tool in that can be used for a variety of reasons. These addendum can include:

  • Moving addendum
  • Performance guarantees
  • Anniversary date cancellations without termination penalty
  • Installation guarantees
  • Construction addendum

3.Business flexibility
Say your business downsizes or expands through an acquisition. Shouldn’t your telecom agreement scale with the organizational change?

4.Technology and product lock in
Your carrier should not penalize you if you are scaling products within their product portfolio. As long as you maintain a certain level of spend and within the same carrier product portfolio every business deserves the right to upgrade their services at will.

5.Missing service level agreements
Let’s face it, your network is the lifeblood of your business. It’s how you connect to your customers and they connect to you. Without a service level agreement in place there is the risk of outages and unreliable service

So, the next time you are shopping for phone and Internet service make sure you have these five pointers in place and things will be just fine.

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