5 Reasons Why You Dread Wireless Contract Negotiations

If you’ve ever had to take care of your company’s mobile or wireless contract, you probably already know how complicated things can get. From stubborn salespeople to confusing contracts, everything around this endeavor is tedious and time consuming for most clients. However, our teams at Expertel have been doing it even before our company was a thing, so we can say by experience that contract negotiation requires a certain amount of skill to do right. That’s why in this week’s article we’ll take you behind the scenes to show you some of the most challenging aspects of contract negotiation. We’ll start with some of the basic interactions, but by the end, we’re pretty sure you’ll have a firm grasp of the complexity behind proper contract negotiation. Let’s get into it!

1. The Endless Back and Forth

Basically, this is how contract negotiation goes for a lot of people: You go in knowing exactly what you want. You sit down and meet with the sales representative. You explain to them exactly what you want in your plan, and what you don’t. At this point, instead of a confirmation, the sales rep will probably offer you a different plan with some of the things you want and a couple of addons that include the rest of the features, along with extra services you don’t need. You clarify exactly what you want, but every time, you’ll be hit with a new and “improved” offer. This back and forth goes on and on for a while, until you either finally get what you want, or give up. This process, other than being annoying, is also time consuming. It’s been made that way to make it easier for big carriers to slip extra features you don’t need (but still will be charged for), which leads us to our next item on the list.

2. Recognizing Empty Promises

We know how easy it is to “go with the flow” during a contract negotiation with your mobile or wireless provider. After all, you might have been waiting a while to get to talk to the sales rep and you’re pressed on time, or maybe the sales rep has been telling you all about these awesome features you could add to your plan and, somehow, it’s starting to make sense. Watch out, though, even if what they’re telling you sounds good on paper, always try to think twice about whether what they’re offering adds value to your business, and pay a lot of attention to what’s being promised on the spot. Make sure that before you sign your contract, everything you’ve been promised is in it. It will be a lot harder to file a complaint or enforce your contract if the feature you’re claiming doesn’t show up on the document you signed. “That could never happen to me!”, some might say, however, they might not be taking into account our next point.

3. Comparing Proposals from
Multiple Carriers

Making a decision is far easier when you’re not dealing with a wide range of options, however, if you’re hunting for the best deal available, you’ll be forced to look for it in more than one place. This means that you’ll have to endure the back and forth, and at the same time, be on the lookout for missed products on services for the many offers that each carrier will give you. Not so easy now, right? Navigating through the myriad of proposals from multiple carriers can be as frustrating as it is confusing, especially when you’re dealing with dozens and dozens of different lines, plans and necessary features. Just think about the amount of time and work needed to manage a fleet of 100+ phones that have different contract end dates. Pretty chaotic to say the least, and yet, it is something that must be done, and must be done right. Now, let’s assume you’ve managed to negotiate good proposals for each carrier and you’re carefully considering the pros and cons of each one. By this point you’re almost certain which deal you’re going with, but out of nowhere, your determination is shaken by an unexpected call. You’re not done yet. Get ready for our next item.

4. There Is Always a Second Round

Remember all those sales representatives? They’re back, more insistent than ever. We can’t blame them, though, after all, it’s their job to persuade you to sign up with their carrier, and they’ve been training for years to learn how to do it. This time around will be slightly different. For starters, they’ll remember exactly what you asked for in the first place, and they’ll be willing to give it to you with added benefits if you choose to sign up with them. You might also notice that they’ll be particularly friendly, compliant and attentive to what you’re saying, especially when you’re explaining the reasons why you’re choosing another carrier. Again, they’ll try to persuade you with even more benefits (that you don’t really need) or better prices (that they didn’t offer the first time around). Sounds good right? Why not just go with them? Well, because depending on how many carriers you reached out to, you might get these types of calls from most of them. Constantly. Sweetening the deal they’ve offered, even further, every time. Which leads us to our last point.

5. You’ll Have to Learn How to Live
with Uncertainty

Our main worry whenever we get a new client’s request, is to make sure we’re getting the best deal possible out of all, and as we’ve explained through this article, it’s not easy. There are so many things that go into successfully getting the deal you want, and even then, you might feel as if you could have gotten a better one elsewhere. If it weren’t for our decades of experience working with (and for) big carriers, we would also have a hard time distinguishing what is best for you and your business. We understand how hard it is for a regular person to know what a great deal looks like. In fact, it’s the reason we got into this business. We wanted to level the playing field for the small entrepreneurs so that they, too, could rest easy knowing that they got the best deal possible. It’s what we do, and that’s pretty much everything we have to say about it.

Before we finish with this weekly blog post, we want to invite our readers who are struggling with their business’ mobile contracts negotiation, or anyone who wants to skip this complicated process altogether, to reach out to us at Expertel. We’ve been helping companies of all sizes with their mobile and wireless needs for years, and we can help you too! If you’re interested in getting Expertel to help you with your current, or future, contract negotiation, you can get in touch by following this link to our contact page. We hope you found today’s information useful, and if you did, you can also check out our previous articles that cover a wide range of interesting topics. That’s all for this entry, but we’ll see you next week in our blog post.