Australian consumers and businesses are being billed for calls they should never have made,services they never ordered at prices they never agreed, results from August and September client analysis have shown.
According to Tony Simmons, Managing Director of The Full Circle Group, “We are still staggered by the level of billing errors being made by Telcos.
It is probably correct to say that if all errors were removed, it would have an impact on Gross Domestic Product (GDP).”
The findings for our clients, based on assessing each call and service against published rates and client contracts have shown errors in almost every single telecommunications bill.
“Not only is it very difficult for clients to identify all of these errors, it is near impossible to gain credits for these over payments. We believe that telecommunications companies need to
be held more accountable for the lack of transparency and accuracy around their billing.
Sadly, clients need to acknowledge that their billing is likely to contain many errors.”
A significant problem with billing is telecommunications systems that are not able to correctly handle charges that are non-standard. It is very easy for errors to creep into bills over time as services are added or changed.
Another key issue is human error. Whilst clients make many errors in respect of its services, Telecommunications companies do not appear to be diligent when making modifications to services, charges or account information.
Simmons says, “There is a myriad of billing problems which can occur. Once they first appear, and are not generally picked up, they will permeate the billing data fro the remainder
of the contract costing a client significant amounts of overcharges. The Telco’s themselves don’t check for accuracy, they just assume it, and therefore wont remove the errors.”
To look further at your telecommunications billing, please visit www.fullcirclegroup.com.au.
Tony Simmons, Managing Director
