BT the UK's largest telecoms provider is dangling the carrotof caopped calls as a means of persuading customers to enter into 1 or 2 year agreements. I have written this article to find out if 'call capping' actually benefits the average business.

Trying to gather call rate information for this task was rather awkward to say the least - BT's website and search facility seemed to make this task 'difficult' to say the least. A few hours of calling to the abyss of extentions and I had the figures I wanted.

Armed with call rates call rates for BT & a few other telecoms prividers, I had to to establish the average call length - BT were not forthcomming with this information. Luckily for me Telecost performed this task in 2002 - they studied the phone records of 100 companies around the UK in various industry sectors. In total some 2 million records were analysed - of course some time has gone by and without a bigger study it is difficult to be certain - but here are the results:

Average duration of mobile call (07 number) - 110 seconds.

Average duration of national call (01 number) - 112 seconds.

Average length of landline call (02 numbers) - 121 seconds.

Assuming that the average call length therefore is 2 minutes:

A 2 minute call on BT Standard Rate to mobile is 45p and to landline is 15p inc BT's call setup fee.

A 2 minute call on BT's 'Business Plan' to mobile is 25p(capped) and a 2 minute call to landline is 8p on a 1 year contract.

A 2 minute call on BT's 'Oneplan' to mobile is 20p(capped) and to landline is 5p(capped) on a 2 year contract with 2 extra BT services required.

A 2 minute call through Westlake LCR to mobile would cost 18p and to landline would cost 2.5p on a one year contract.

A 2 minute mobile call using Midland LCR to mobile is 16p and a 2 minute landline call is 1.8p on a 1 year contract with a minimum call spend requirement.

A 2 minute call using Gradwell VOIP to mobile would cost 20p and a 2 minute call to landline would be free(subject to acceptable usage otherwise would cost 2.5p) on a 3 month contract.

The conclusion therefore is:- if your business makes average length calls then you are probably better off with LCR or VOIP, however if your business calls are typically long then BT offers good value, however...

The best possible way to route business calls is to use a VOIP phone system such as Asterisk that is able to route calls via the more efficiently. For example customers may route all 01 numbers through VOIP to take advantage of the all inclusive tarif and unlimited outbound trunks, use GSM gateways for free calls to staff mobiles (a big chunk of a typicall business phone bill) & achieve mobile call rates as low as 4.5p. It is also not a bad idea to have some BT lines on 'Oneplan' - for long length calls (users can have buttons on their phones that say long calls or can be made to press a button before dialling out)

This is guide to help UK companies make a more informed decision about their comms - the information above was obtained on Sept 08 hence e&oe.