I'm interested in the types of controls companies use for payment of telecom bills. Bill goes to Telecom/IT manager for approval (or) Bill goes to AP and is paid if $amount is within limits (or) Something else?
Any feedback re. best practices is appreciated.
Approval Process for Telecom Bills?
Answers
We have a lot of telecom reimbursement issues. We check every reimbursement request against a list of titles that are approved to expense their telecom bills and for what amount (execs tend to have higher bills, esp with overseas travel). Then A/P looks at every line on the summary, and looks for outliers in the bill itself. We make sure that the company is only paying for the employee, not their family! Then we look for outlier calls - we've found some whoppers.
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Thanks much, this is exactly the kind of feedback I can use. Sounds like you are referring to cell phone expenses. That's the toughest of all to control given the complexity of plans and their variable nature (usage-based). So all the better that you audit the requests because there's lots of opportunity for problems. I suggest looking into a Cellular Optimization service (I won't self promote by mentioning my partner, but you can easily google it and find many). They are very effective in generating savings (I can share their tricks if you want to know) and often work on contingency. The biggest benefit for you might be freeing up time for your AP people with no out-of-pocket.
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