Like any other utility expense, street lights can cause unnecessary overhead costs to the towns and cities who run them. So what does one need in order to perform a Street Light Audit?
The Street light Audit Checklist:
1.Does the city have any metered street lights, or are they all unmetered?
2.An inventory of street lights
3.A current month’s copy of all bills associated with street lights and outdoor/security lighting. (There may be only one, but there can be more. We received an excel spreadsheet that may have had some billing information in it, but a scanned copy of the bill(s) would be better.
4.A copy of the letter of authorization/agency (assuming it covers subs) so we can speak directly to the utility company.
5.Copies of any agreements between the DOT and the client regarding highway lighting and/or maintenance.
6.Copies of any service agreements between the utility and the client.
7.A list of outdoor (security) lighting, including number, wattage and type, if known, and whether metered or unmetered.
8.A copy of the sales tax exemption certificate for the city (seller: please leave blank)
9.Any previous electric providers that may have served the city, if applicable, and the approximate dates of service.
10.Contact Information:
oWho in the organization pays the bills?
oWho is most familiar with street lights?
oWho is the account manager at the utility company who handles the city’s account?
These are the items we will need for every city we audit for street lights and outdoor/security lighting. Not every city will have every piece of information, but if they don’t have it, it is better to make a note of the missing items, or else we will delay the audit not knowing they don’t have it.
Contact Paul Steberger of Applied Utility Auditors Today to get started. 877•209•0021
Applied Utility Auditors helps a wide range of businesses update and select the best telecom solutions for their needs. This is an example of a Cisco Call Manager Solution that moved a premise based Call manager to the cloud. It is one of many Call Manger Solutions offered by or Partners.
ABT ASSOCIATES
ABT Associates is a mission-driven, global leader in research and program implementation in the fields of health, social and environmental policy, and international development. Known for its rigorous approach to solving complex challenges, ABT Associates is regularly ranked as one of the top 20 global research firms and one of the top 40 international development innovators.
HEADQUARTERS: Cambridge, Massachusetts
EMPLOYEES: 1045 domestic, 2000 in Africa
LOCATIONS: 4 US locations
NUMBER OF SEATS: 1045
THE CHALLENGE
Abt Assoc. had been using NWN for premise-based Cisco Call Manager services. With very limited IT resources the company lacked the expertise to pull together its disparate communications tools. It was also using different collaboration tools – Cisco Jabber, Microsoft Lync and Google apps – that did not integrate with each other.
SOLUTION
We moved the voice services to VoiceMaxx CE and into the cloud. We also supplied ControlMaxx for their 20 contact center workers. Since the company was using Cisco already, the interfaces for VoiceMaxx CE were nearly identical to those of the Call Manager. InterCall also provided Abt with 3000 WebEx licenses. In order to federate their disparate messaging and presence platforms, We also implemented NextPlane, which allowed their US locations using Cisco Jabber to integrate with their Australian location, which was locked into Microsoft Lync.
YOUR SOLUTION
Every business faces unique challenges. The best solution for you may have more to do with integration of current applications than with apparent rates and fees. Applied Utility Auditors and Applied Telecom Solutions make your solution seeking simple. We know the industry inside and out, and can help you get running efficiently and effectively. Call Paul Steberger today to learn more. 877-209-0021
It’s both amazing and saddening to comprehend just how often and how easy it is for a utility company to overcharge businesses and residents alike. As Elizabeth City Electric Customers found out over this holiday season, its can be as simple as employee laziness and an overeager rush to holiday vacation. In an effort to get to Christmas vacation as quickly as possible, Elizabeth City Meter Readers read the meters early for over 600 customers, including business and residential electric customers. Somehow this resulted in these customers being charged for two months worth of electricity in December rather than one. Merry Christmas Elizabeth City! Double bills for everyone!
Luckily, customers were able to spot the error and call attention to it.
In our experience at Applied Utility Auditors, these overcharges, more often than not, go unnoticed and unresolved on over-complicated utility bill statements. Luckily for our business customers, it costs nothing to have your utility bills examined for overcharges. We only get paid if you get a refund from the utility.
Resolve to not get ripped off by the utilities in the New Year. Call Paul at AUA: 877 -209-0021
By TMCnet Special GuestJoel Maloff, Vice President, Marketing, BandTel For a service that was forecast by Gartner (News – Alert) last year to be part of a more than $2 billion market segment by 2011, SIP trunking remains one of those technical phrases used in vendor circles that is marched out with pride to prospective distributors and customers and received by the marketplace with bewilderment. SIP trunking – despite the name – can be a valuable service alternative for many enterprises, and we will do our best to dispel the confusion.
In a survey commissioned by my company earlier this year, we discovered that even so-called industry experts – analysts, reporters, and others – could not agree on a definition for SIP trunking, nor could they consistently identify the leaders in delivery of SIP trunking services. However, it is not hard to understand the confusion in the general marketplace. For example, a February 2008 Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) draft document entitled “What is a Session Initiation Protocol (News – Alert) (SIP) Trunk Anyway?” provided the following definition:
The same draft also describes SIP trunking in more mainstream circles as a service for enterprises that allows connection to the PSTN as a displacement for circuit-based connections, and as a replacement for costly leased lines connecting distributed telephone systems within an enterprise.
So let’s cut through the mystery and confusion. SIP trunking, simply put, is a way for organizations to accomplish something that they already do, but for less money, with equal or better quality, and with greater functionality. It is also a way for enterprises that were too small and could not afford leased line services to achieve comparable benefits as the big boys but for much more attractive fees than previously. All of this is now achievable because of the underlying packet-switched technology of the Internet as opposed to circuit-switched architecture from the past. SIP is simply the framework that vendors and service providers have agreed to use to accomplish the completion of telephone calls and much more.
Another challenge is that SIP trunking providers differ from one another, and can roughly be grouped in the following three categories: SIP trunks via dedicated lines, SIP trunks in conjunction with hosted services, and pure SIP trunking providers.
The first group – SIP trunks via dedicated lines – includes all of those service providers that require a T-1, PRI, DSL, or other similar “circuit” for utilization of their services. Given that our definition earlier for SIP trunking was the elimination of dedicated circuits and their associated costs, this group seems to be a hybrid of past and present. The advantage offered by this group is that they can control the quality of the service from the enterprise into their network. When Internet telephony was in its infancy, this was beneficial to those organizations that could afford leased lines. Today, Internet telephony via SIP continues to achieve outstanding quality, bringing into question the value of a leased connection. Additionally, SIP trunk providers requiring a leased line for access are inherently limited in service delivery regions by the availability of such circuits. That is not the case for SIP trunk providers that can use any broadband connection to the enterprise.
The second group provides SIP trunks as an adjunct to the delivery of hosted IP PBX (News – Alert) or other comparable services. SIP trunking is secondary. Whereas SIP trunks may be quite beneficial to organizations with legacy telephone systems, this group of providers is oftentimes most interested in displacing the existing system. Furthermore, these service providers may not be able to provide services in widely dispersed geographic areas due to the deployment and scalability of their systems.
The last group – pure SIP trunk providers – has created underlying network architectures that are focused on the delivery of SIP trunking. These organizations do not compete with premises equipment implementations or providers, do not require a dedicated circuit, generally cover a wide range of locations, and are focused on delivery of excellent quality and value.
SIP trunking may not be a great service name but it is, without question, a great service with significant benefits for many enterprises worldwide.
Joel Maloff (News – Alert) serves as Vice President of Marketing for BandTel, and is responsible for creation of the product and services roadmap, marketing documentation, and communications with customers, prospects, and the industry at large. A frequent speaker at industry conferences, he has authored four books and numerous articles on Internet, business applications for Internet, network security, and international Internet development. He has also served as advisor to former Senator Al Gore and Senator John Kyl on Internet-related issues.
TMCnet publishes expert commentary on various telecommunications, IT, call center, CRM and other technology-related topics. Are you an expert in one of these fields, and interested in having your perspective published on a site that gets several million unique visitors each month? Get in touch.
The telecommunications industry was changed forever by the designing and creation of VoIP technology.
That is the view of Rob Lith, director of Connection Telecom, who explained a number of “dramatic and irreversible” alterations have been made to the market as a direct result of the solution arriving on the scene, reports IT Web.
He noted VoIP technology dates back as far as 1974, when internet protocol (IP) initially made its debut. This eliminated the need for costly voice and data networks and allowed conversations to be held on converged networks.
Of course, there have been many changes to VoIP itself in the years since it was first used by businesses and homeowners, but the principle remains the same. The arrival of the system forced telecommunications companies to think about its implementation and infrastructure is being revamped.
A new generation of VoIP providers has been made possible by market liberalization and the hard work of many firms.
Another encouraging trend is the arrival of a range of new applications that “keep cropping up”, according to Mr Lith. These are sure to have a positive impact on the market and could continue to make VoIP even easier to use and more beneficial to companies.
Underlining the long-term appeal of the technology, Mr Lith said: “It is difficult to imagine IP being replaced soon by anything less dramatic than unmediated telecommunication – in other words telepathy.”
He went on to explain IP “continues to break new ground in the unified communications arena”, which is sure to be welcomed by all those who want to invest in the very best technology on the market.
Mr Lith said the opportunities that could be opened up as a result are “limitless” or, perhaps more accurately, limited only by the imaginations of the developers and designers behind the applications and products that are made available.
The telecommunications industry was changed forever by the designing and creation of VoIP technology. That is the view of Rob Lith, director of Connection Telecom, who explained a number of “dramatic and irreversible” alterations have be… continue reading
Posted 2 weeks 1 day ago in: General VoIP