Telecom Purchase Saga – Let me sum up

Our company needs to renew our telecom/internet services this year, and I’ll be working with our Controller to do so. I thought it might make a good case study in B2B sales & marketing. And my blog would make a good place to vent about the experience.

Unfortunately, rather than a case-study, it already feels like a saga. We’re two months into it and it’s nothing but a chore. Our existing contract is with the #1 player in the field. In the past we’ve had limited options due to our factory-in-a-cornfield location.

Two real alternatives I looked at:

• My first look was at microwave-wireless service, which promises more bandwidth at less cost. But without any savings in phone service, it isn’t enough. I really liked this choice otherwise.
• My second look was at VOIP phone system, which would save telco costs and add cool & helpful features. But the price tag on buying new phones is a sticking point. The VOIP dealer also proposed their own telecom service.

Then the existing-vendor (we’ll call AAA) game started:

• The direct-rep called and told me he was now independent. He emailed me a pretty reasonable quote for VOIP service that didn’t require new phones and added bandwidth.
• An AAA appointment setter cold-called me and said they would connect me with a new rep.
• The AAA guy visited for an hour with his tech guy, who wore a bluetooth earpiece the whole time. He seemed especially excited to help us limit internet usage of our staff. They left in their shiny BMW.
• Several requests to the AAA guy failed to get us a summary of our existing usage. It appears to me his primary goal is face-to-face meetings.
• I’ve probably heard from three other AAA independent reps in the meantime. And AAA appointment setter re-called me about a month later.
• All that and I still haven’t heard from the rep who sold us our current contract.

Now I’ve been cold-called by a communciations consultant service. Maybe I can turn this ugliness over to them? But the caller is just an appointment setter so I can talk to their sales manager in a week-and-a-half. Sheesh. Qualify me now, send me some literature, or have a decent website, please.

My core problem is that I don’t have a record of long-distance minutes used over the last year. So I can’t judge the proposals accurately. Our bill just shows a cost, without showing minutes used. A separate call-records report is something we haven’t been getting. And AAA’s customer service wasn’t too helpful in getting this info. Blah.

I update you here as more drama and stupidity of the telecom saga continues.