User help needed to lower phone bill

The 435th Communications Group paid more than $1.2 million last fiscal year in commercial toll charges supporting Air Force installations in the KMC region.
Telephone users can help combat the high cost of toll charges, and lower base phone bills, by reducing the frequency and duration of personal calls.

“In Germany, any call to a commercial off-base phone or cellular phone incurs toll charges,” said Maj. Kevin Payne, 835th Communications Squadron commander. “Due to this billing structure,” he said, “calls from desktop, land-line phones to cellular phones alone totaled more than $720,000 last fiscal year.”
During work, personnel are permitted to make local calls for personal business as long as they are not excessive.

“Keeping those calls as short as possible and avoiding calls to cellular phones, unless necessary to support the mission, cuts our costs considerably,” said Major Payne.
To ensure accountability, the Telephone Control Officer program requires unit TCOs to review phone call data and check for any excessive use of unofficial calls. Also in the future, most callers needing to make long-distance and international calls will require a personal identification number to simplify caller tracking.

“The 435th CG secured an agreement from Deutsche Telekom last year to lower phone rates for commercial and cellular phone calls,” Major Payne said, “and the lower rates for desktop, land-line phones took effect Oct. 1.”

Cellular phone rate decreases will be phased in between February and April. More than 2,000 government cell phones will be migrated to a virtual private network.
“The only difference callers will notice with VPN,” said Major Payne, “is less digits to dial because the government cellular phones will be in a new virtual area code.
“Our customers will see no difference in their telephone service,” he said.

For further information about telephone billing or the TCO program call the 835th CS customer service office at 480-3278.