Circuit Contract Negotiations
Just about anything can be negotiated to a cheaper price or better terms if one just asks and data & phone connections are usually a major portion of the network expenses. Even if none of their other customers have asked to negotiate, call their sales number and ask for a manager. Simply asking the manager over the phone for a better price or a waived fee is a form of negotiations too. For larger businesses with many circuits contract negotiation is a given and is more involved. When you start contract negotiations remember that the power is with the customer not spending money with them not the other way around. It doesn’t matter if you are negotiating for a 56k dialup account or a thousand T3 connections. The worst thing that they can do is not offer you a better deal. Be sure to force them to compete. Negotiations should not be strictly a win-lose thing. Both parties should come out ahead, and there is plenty to negotiate on other than price.
When you approach a company for multiple circuits be sure to include your current inventory. If you are asking for a circuit be sure to include the address and the type of cable. If a carrier is asked to provide a bid on multiple connections but does not know where in the state a circuit is going to be they are effectively being asked to take the risk of contracting something they don’t know the cost or carrier on. While it is common for providers to contract and bill for circuits provided by other carriers they are likely to add a margin to cover the risk. Obviously this means than every circuit the company has must be recorded with the address, serial number, type, cost, etc. to maintain a current inventory database after contract negotiations as circuits are added and dropped. Be sure to scrub the current cost before sending it to the carrier for a bid. Also be sure to reconcile this against both the bills received and business needs as time passes.
Please continue on to: Circuit contract terms for negotiations.