NeoTel – NeoConnect Lite 99, Our selection process

01Dec08

Having finalised the purchase of Janus IT Solutions last week, it was time to look for an ‘office phone’. Only a year ago, there would have been no choice other than calling Telkom, waiting a month for a call back and possibly another few months for the installation – not to mention the onerous forms requiring completion in triplicate that would form part of the application process..

While I’m not a Telkom fan, there broadband ADSL offering is currently in a league of its own when comparing it to other broadband offerings. I say that from both cost and performance perspective and of course based on your requirement being for a fixed broadband offering. Any mobile broadband requirment is of course a different story and something I will cover in a later blog.

First and foremost, as with any purchase, one has to make an unbiased decision based on facts, What I call cutting through the ‘noise’ and finding the ‘tune’. Particularly with technology purchases, you have to really know your requirements and disregard all the nice-to-have’s that the products advertisers will have you believe are have-to-haves. 

Our requirments where:

• We needed a telephone to make and receive voice calls.
• If no one was in the office, the calls would be forwarded to our cell phones.
• If at all possible, it should be easily transferable if we moved office
• Probably most importantly, the call quality should be excellent.
• The rental cost should be competitive
• Call costs should be competitive

So, onto Telkom’s website, downloaded there price list and then onto Neotel’s website for there tariff guide. This Neotel page is also worth a visit if you want to see the ‘features’ of the Neotel device.

Without going through the comparative process in detail, probably worthless as your detailed requirments would differ from ours, one Neotel benefit that stood out was they bill per second from the start of the call. Telkomcharges a ‘minimum charge’ and then only charges per second. So, if you are doing cold calls in your marketing drive, you know that most of those calls normally end in less than a minute and there are of course many calls made. The Telkom cost would therefore be much higher in this case.

With VAT, Telkom’s local calls come in at 65c / min (minimum charge) and then 34c per minute after that. Neotel’s is charged at 0.34c / min with no minimum charge. Rental costs are R99 / per month for Neotel and R124.20 / per month for Telkom. 

The Neotel phone on the NeoConnect 99 option requires an outright purchase of the device costing R599.00. Looking at the monthly saving on rental, that was not a big price to pay. One also has to purchase a phone if going with Telkom but in fairness, these devices start at R150.00 if you really shop around so a bonus point there for Telkom.

Having the facts, we decided to go with Neotel. One simply logs onto there website, check that you have Neotel coverage in your area and then fill in the online application form. The online application form was not of the usual painful varieties either which was a welcome change.

I called Neotel a day later just to make sure the ball was rolling. Impressive was that the call was answered in under a minute. The operator wasn’t impressive but did manage to answer my simply query for an update on the application process. What was also nice is she was able to give me our new number – great for us as we could get the business cards and stationary sorted out more quickly.

We now await the device which should be delivered to us within ‘48 hours’ according to the marketing gumff.

 

 

 

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