Basics Of Telecom Billing Solution

The telecom billing software is a important component in the set of systems that modern telecom services providers need to deliver the service. It has very little to do with actually delivering the service or maintaining the service, but a lot to do with collecting the revenues that keep the ISP running. With a wide range of service offerings across various media, flexible and robust systems are useful.

In voice services, things look very straight forward and we have standardized rates almost everywhere with unlimited local calling. But a simple service like phone can have other complexities like long distance charges and local number portability wherein you switch operators and want to retain the number, among other things. These may not look daunting, but they are vital for the ISP to remain profitable. Robust billing systems can track these and bill accordingly.

The more modern solutions, like cellular services, have even more complexities in offerings. In developed nations, the introduction of 3G services has meant that mobile networks are now being used for both voice and data services. The rates for both are different and so are their usages. In the developing nations, there are multiple short term and long term plans for plain 2G voice services too. The billing systems need to address all these variations.

While the importance of telecom billing solutions is clear, their deployment needs to be looked at in more detail. There are many aspects of a proper billing solution that need to be considered. A standard billing solution will encompass everything from hardware to customer support - the complete cycle.

First it is the telecom billing software hardware and a stable, scalable and flexible software for accurate billing. The next is to determine billing cycles. Really good billing systems may be able to maintain individual billing cycles, but the most common ones tend to have pre-defined billing cycles that need to be agreed on.

The next is the bill distribution feature. For many customers, a paper bill is the preferred method of getting billing information. So you need to print and post the bills and that requires a good automated system to do these things, along with a reliable distribution network. After distributing the bills, you need an equally good system to collect the payments.

The final spoke in the billing solution wheel is the billing inquiry support system. Customers can be billed incorrectly due to errors from the ISP or software problems. Alternative, the customer can interpret the bills incorrectly. Whatever the problem, the issue need a resolution. The customer care department need to address these.

All in all, telecom OSS is vital for modern telecom services providers. With the varied customer requirements and market demands of variations in plans, a robust billing system is mandatory to track usage, bill customers and collect payments. As an ISP, the whole telecom billing system has to be well thought of and just investing in software is not enough.