RM Online - Phone bills, bar codes and color

Your phone bill may be too high

Your next phone call may be very expensive - you may be scammed! It may be a rip-off without your local phone company even knowing because of industry deregulation.

There are three different ways your commercial and/or residential bill may be invaded: slamming, bamming or cramming.

Slamming is when another phone company or re-seller of a large "block-of-telephone time" moves your current basic phone service to its business without your authorization, knowledge or complete understanding about the "new" service and its charges. To prevent this, tell your current phone service to "freeze" your service providers.

Bamming usually happens at pay phones, using cash, card or billing to another number. It often takes two: a phone company to charge high rates and a business owner willing to profit from a percentage of the dollar volume made from the phones. Use of your phone card, dialing a special access number, or calling an 800 or 888 number are no protection because they may be blocked (which is illegal) and you get that "big" access charge on the monthly phone bill anyway. The only precaution may be to check before dialing the name on the phone service (not the equipment name) and if you do not recognize it, avoid using that phone. The phone in your hotel room or hotel lobby may be bammed!

Cramming is the latest scam on your wallet and probably not the last. You've seen the forms: Sign up here to win a Free Vacation to the Bahamas, or Win a Free Car, etc. Many of these forms are appearing all over and in their fine print you are authorizing charges to your phone bill for items such as entry fees for the drawing ($20), to add special phone services that you may or may not have now (at higher prices?) or a change in your basic telephone service provider (at a higher rate?). If you like to enter these kinds of drawings, you must read all the fine print.

If you think you have been scammed via your phone bill, check it for unusual names, descriptions, "service charges" or higher-than-average costs for calls - such as $4 to $8 per minute for a local call. Obviously, if you receive a bill from a telephone company you are not subscribing to or have never heard of, you probably have been slammed.

Remember: the phone company that sends your monthly bill is just passing on the charges for "all" of those "authorized services" you have agreed to that are "networked" to them as a result of the deregulation of the industry. It may be difficult to change, cancel or delete charges already on your bill.

Bar codes - what for and when?

I recently spoke with some rental-industry software providers about using bar codes with their systems. Generally it is available and/or already part of their software. That means there are users of this technology.

People from Systematic Software and Solutions by Computer told me that not many rental businesses are using bar coding even when it's available. It appears that one of two things needs to exist for the implementation of bar codes: the desire for a high degree of inventory control of rental, sale or accessory items, or the need to process a high volume of "multi" items quickly and accurately.

Some uses of bar codes that have been mentioned in our industry are:

Resale items - especially in the party goods area.
"Prop" shops - to keep pieces together that should be together.
Audio, video and camera items and accessories - to control all those small parts.
Linens and costumes - use heat-applied bar-coded tagging.
Portable "Johns" and the accessories that go with them.
Small engine parts - eliminates the need for a stockroom clerk.
General repair and maintenance parts - to know when you are about to run out of an item.
Preferred customers - provided a special bar-coded card.

Many other bar-code applications probably exist in our industry, so please send me your ideas. This column is only as good as what you send me or tell me about. Bar coding is available so let's make use of it if it makes sense to our bottom line.

What color is your counter?

On my way to the A.R.A. Western Conference last fall, I stopped at Brad Bengson's new store in Boise, Idaho. It was nice and clean, with off-white walls lined with a gray pegboard and everything in its place! New stores have a habit of looking great and Brad's was no exception.

One dramatic aspect - Brad's em-ployees' uniform shirts complement the color of the customer counter. When the green-shirted employees are working at the marble-green laminate-covered counter, it is impressive. I have not seen this color combination used before in any of my rental store visits. Usually I see gray, brown or some other basic, serviceable color for the counter. Brad's counter also does not show the dirt easily because of the random nature of the marbleizing in the green laminate surface.

The idea of having this sort of color coordination in our type of business is another step toward showing our customers that we can be as good looking as those "big" retailers down the street (with very little cost). I have always thought: "If your place of business and your employees look good and your product and service also appear good to the customer, you will probably avoid a lot of potential customer hassles - such as the price is too high; it didn't do the job; it was dirty; breakdowns; etc."