Telecommunication Expense Management: How to Audit Your Bills, Reduce Expenses and Negotiate Favorable Rates

Rating:
Summary: Strother book is better
Review: Brosnan and Messina write an excellent guide to managing costs for urban east coast businesses (i.e. New York). Much of their stuff is super-technical and a little impractical for the average telecom manager. And they don't say much about contract negotiation, RFPs, and wireless services (which can be fairly expensive nowadays).

For a much simpler perspective I suggest the book by S.C. Strother "Telecommunications Cost Management". It costs more than this book, but its well worth it. It is well-organized and more comprehensive. You get the feeling Brosnan and Messina are telecom lawyers, while Strother seems to be a telecom insider.

Rating:
Summary: Strother book is better
Review: If you are interested in the concept of reducing your telecommunications expenses this book is an excellent start. If you are interested in a career in telecommunication consulting reviewing telecom expense this is a very basic document. The content covers about 50% of the most common billing irregularities.

A better guide to telecommunications concepts and language is "The Essential Guide to Telecommunications" (Second Edition).

The authors point out that they are most familiar with Bell Atlantic and Ameritech CSRs (Customer Service Records). This limits the information made available in conveying the differences in format and content between ILECs (Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers) documentation.

Rating:
Summary: Insufficient Information
Review: If you are interested in the concept of reducing your telecommunications expenses this book is an excellent start. If you are interested in a career in telecommunication consulting reviewing telecom expense this is a very basic document. The content covers about 50% of the most common billing irregularities.

A better guide to telecommunications concepts and language is "The Essential Guide to Telecommunications" (Second Edition).

The authors point out that they are most familiar with Bell Atlantic and Ameritech CSRs (Customer Service Records). This limits the information made available in conveying the differences in format and content between ILECs.

Rating:
Summary: Strother book is better
Review: The book is excellent if your telecom is on the east coast and you only care about local telephone service. It is very detailed about problems with Customer Service Records but says nothing about wireless telecom, and does not adequately cover data networking, or long distance. For a more comprehensive resource, I recommend "Telecommunications Cost Management" by Strother.

Rating:
Summary: Very light on useful information
Review: This book mostly states the obvious. My job involves telecom and finances, and there's no useful material that helps me do my job better.