Itemizing employee cell-phone calls doesn't pay

Think businesses can save big bucks by monitoring employee cell phone use?

Think again, says a recent study from researcher In-Stat.

Many companies require employees with corporate cell phones to itemize and pay for their personal calls. But that rarely saves more than $20 a bill, says In-Stat wireless analysts Bill Hughes.

And the savings often are much lower — or nonexistent.

It usually takes about 10 minutes to itemize a cell phone bill, Hughes says.

Companies must pay employees for that time. The wage paid is often greater than the few pennies saved on the phone bill, he says.

"Splitting up cell phone bills is an exercise in futility," says Delly Tamer, CEO of cell phone retailer Let's Talk.

Yet 29 percent of the businesses surveyed by In-Stat required employees to itemize their bills.

That's probably because many companies adopted cell phone policies several years ago, when bills regularly topped $100 a month.

But now prices are much lower. They've tumbled about 10 percent in the past 18 months and continue to fall, Tamer says.

The average corporate cell phone bill for voice calls is about $62, Hughes says. (Data services, such as e-mail and Web browsing, cost extra.)

And today's cell phone plans usually let customers make hundreds of minutes of calls without incurring extra charges, Tamer says.

That makes it much less risky for a company to pick up the entire bill. It no longer makes sense to "nickel-and-dime employees," he says.

Dodd Technologies, an Indianapolis-based event production company, agrees. It pays for almost all employee cell phone calls. Employees are asked to chip in if they exceed a preset number of minutes a month, which is rare, says marketing director Bill Edwards.

Although the 30-person firm works hard to control budgets, "it costs time and money" to itemize a bill, Edwards says.

There are more-effective ways to lower cell phone costs, including:

Buying in bulk. Instead of buying individual cell phone plans, businesses can buy one plan for the whole company. The minutes purchased are shared by everyone, reducing extra charges and lowering costs, Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Brenda Raney says.

AT&T Wireless providestracking data that help companies monitor the plan, AT&T Wireless Vice President Joe Lueckenhoff says.

Many corporate plans offer unlimited calls to other cell phones from the same carrier, he says. That lets employees call each other without worrying about extra fees, he says.

Limiting data plans. Voice service may be inexpensive, but e-mail, text-messaging and other data services can easily make a cell phone bill top $150, Tamer says. Only offer data plans to employees who really need them, he says.