Customer Needs

Quality of Service | Cost Savings | Accurate & User Friendly Cost Reporting | Ongoing Tariff Management

Quality of Service

Personal & Proactive

The alternative carrier marketplace is littered with disgruntled customers, frustrated by empty promises dealing with suppliers that do not value, nor add value to their business. Large established service providers are a victim of their own success; massive investment requires sales on a grand scale, unfortunately investment in customer service and account management resource rarely runs parallel. The words ‘transparent’ and ‘seamless’ are often used by prospective suppliers to define an ‘ideal’ standard of service that is impossible to deliver.

Venture’s ethos is based on delivering an impeccable service; we make every effort to ensure our customers receive all the help and advice they require. We only partner with Network Operators, Tier 1 Carriers & SIP Providers to route our customers’ calls thus minimising the likelihood or risk of network failure or downtime.

Rate Reduction

Maximising Cost Savings without Compromising Quality of Service

Alternative carriers to BT provide access to a more cost effective means of communication; due to fierce competition between carriers the company offering the best tariff is constantly changing. Unless customers switch carrier on a regular basis they will not benefit from on-going cost reductions; in most cases this degree of flexibility is not possible due to a lack of resource. This is where Venture can assist; as an Aggregator Venture manages its customers’ call traffic on a daily basis using only those carriers who remain competitive within the marketplace at any given time.

The majority of service providers would lead customers to believe that airtime/bandwidth varies in ‘rate’ alone whereby the cheapest tariff governs the best deal; unfortunately this is not the case. There are real differences in line quality [audibility and robustness of service].

All service providers, including BT, compress; those that do so above 5:1 run the risk of providing a poor service; in simple terms should a service provider compress beyond 5:1 customers may experience difficulty in connecting with their destination number or poor audibility. Network and Tier 1 Carriers compress at 5:1 or below negating the risk of their customers experiencing connectivity problems.

Within the confines of Network Operators and Tier 1 carriers differences in rate / tariff signal particular strengths and weaknesses, i.e. where a carrier or network has an abundance of capacity to particular destinations they offer more competitive rates as opposed to those destinations where they have little or no capacity and are reliant upon a third party i.e. another carrier or network to deliver their customers’ calls.

As an Aggregator, Venture manages its customers’ calls, routing them with whatever carrier offers the best rate / tariff without compromising connectivity i.e. we cherry pick.

Single Service Provider Solution

Single Service Provider – Access to Multiple Carriers – Single Invoice

Assuming customers were prepared to subscribe to a variety of carriers this would result in multiple invoices; the result being that it would take lengthy investigation to collate any useful management information.

With Venture, regardless of the number of carriers used to deliver the best combination of service and tariff, all charges are presented on a single invoice.

Billing Information

Accurate & User Friendly Cost Reporting

Transparent and accurate invoicing has been somewhat of an uphill struggle to achieve, due to the inconsistent manner in which call data records are supplied by the networks and carriers.

This is compounded when service providers choose to outsource the billing to a third party or rush bills out to customers for quick payment, without running the necessary checks.

Venture’s approach is based on the implementation of an in-house billing platform in order that we are in control of vetting all data records presented by the carrier before they are input and customer bills generated.

Regardless of the number of carriers used to route our customers calls, a single bill is generated. Everything is emailed to the customer which includes the following;

• VAT Invoice [pdf]
• Summary Cost Management Reports [pdf]
• Itemisation [excel]

We also offer a variety of reports tailored to individual customer needs.

Ongoing Tariff Management

Regular Client Reviews

As competition increases and wholesale prices drop, Venture passes on rate reductions to its existing customers; this is not normal practice within the industry as service providers by nature wish to maximise their margins.

This is probably one of the most important criteria when selecting a service provider, but in practice this element is often overlooked; the majority of service providers do not review customer tariffs unless prompted by the customer or in an attempt to retain a customer who has been offered a better deal by an alternative provider. The majority of service providers believe that once a customer has chosen a service provider they will not review the situation more than once every 12 to 18 months, assuming the customer has no issue with quality of service. Service providers also believe that when a client conducts a review and a better offer presents itself they will most probably give their incumbent service provider the opportunity to match or improve on the deal offered by the alternative provider.

In many cases these assumptions hold true, as customers perceive change as an upheaval and time consuming; in reality change is painless and creates no workload for the customer as the new service provider deals with everything.

Venture’s ethos is based on proactive account management, conducting regular customer reviews once every 6 months, at which time rate improvements are presented.

It is also an opportunity to address any issues that may arise and present other associated products and / or services that may be of interest.

We do not wish for our customers to become a figure on the balance sheet; our intention is to add value to a customer’s business and to maintain a personal touch increasing the likelihood of a long-term relationship.