Not only is it important for a provider to communicate with a customer frequently, it may be just as important for the customer to communicate with the provider.
Case in point #4. National ComTel has a high end customer who is dependent on large bandwidth and voice requirements to operate their business. Two weeks before the customer was to move to a new building they decided to let us know that they were moving. When we explained that this will take a little time, they were irate! The expected us to pick up the equipment and simply move it on their schedule.
Because we had taken such good care of them in the past, we had a miracle to perform by getting them several temporary high-speed Internet circuits running before the dedicated circuit was operational.
If the customer would have communicated their plans with us, we would have pre-qualified the new address, ordered the service and equipment, and had their service operational before they moved in while preventing a headache and delay for full operations. On average it takes at least 30 business days to pre-qualify, order, install, test and turn up a new dedicated Internet circuit, once the customer signs the service agreement. A year later when they planned to expand their suite, they called us. Needless to say, they were operational a week before the open date which included additional PC’s, VoIP service, additional network wiring management and security.
We do our very best to educate our customers and others about the industry with monthly letters, blogs, invoice announcements, invoice inserts, emails, phone calls etc. Sometimes the customer has to do their part.
