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Case Study #5

Progress Bedford

The Challenge

In mid 2017, the finance director of Progress Bedford Group, a multi-site Skoda and Suzuki car dealership, contacted us to ask for help. As the group had expanded over the years, telecoms services had been taken on for the different branches on an ad hoc basis. There was no integrated strategy across the sites, they were dealing with multiple service providers and the existing lines/contracts had not been reviewed for some time. As a result, there was no clear overall picture which services were being subscribed to, whether these services were in or out of contract or whether they were being charged at competitive rates. Also, there was the possibility that some services might no longer be required at all, or could be replaced with something newer and more cost effective. It was possible that Progress Bedford were paying well over the odds for their services but the FD didn’t have the time or expertise to look into this. He had worked with Beyond Telecoms Consulting (BTC) some years before when he was at another
dealership, so knew how we would be able to assist in this type of situation.

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The Solution

BTC were engaged to carry out a comprehensive review of Progress Bedford’s telephony across all 7 sites. This work was broken down into the following tasks:

1. Conducting a general review to establish which telecoms services were being
subscribed to at each site, from which service providers and under what contract
terms.

2. Numerical analysis of bills, liaising with service providers when necessary, to
ensure all charges were accounted for.

3. Carrying out site surveys, to identify the use of all phone lines.

4. Looking at the opportunities for cost reduction and consolidation.

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The Benefits

The above review brought complete clarity to the situation. It enabled Progress Bedford’s management to understand what they were spending on telecoms, where it was being spent and where there was the opportunity to make substantial cost savings and/or simplify their telecoms infrastructure.

In summary, BTC identified the following:

£13k per year savings could be achieved by ceasing redundant lines and switching to a single service provider who could provide equivalent services at much more competitive rates.

The findings that led to this conclusion:
1. The 6 existing telecoms service providers were billing a total annual amount
of £44k.
2. In most cases, contracts with these suppliers were either short term or if long
term, were coming towards the end of the minimum term.
3. 10 phone lines across the sites were still being paid for but no longer used
and therefore redundant, as shown by the line audits.
4. Progress Group were, in the main, not being charged competitive rates for
line rentals and associated services as revealed by in depth bill analysis.
Switching to a more competitive provider would reduce the annual telecoms
costs to £31k.
5. The above would also reduce admin costs, by not having to deal with multiple
providers and process multiple invoices each month.