PCS

Who are PCS?

Preferred Contract Services Ltd (PCS) is a provider of professional cleaning services for commercial customers. Based in Croydon, its customers include a variety of schools, companies and other commercial businesses throughout South London, Surrey, Sussex and Kent.

A family-run business, PCS Ltd was set up in 2001, has experienced high growth in recent months and now has over 50 staff and an annual turnover in excess of £250K. What were PCS's requirements? Whilst setting up a new head office in Croydon, PCS was looking for a telecoms company that could provide the entire range of services it needed.

With over 40 staff based away from the office often working outside of regular business hours, a growing customer base, numerous suppliers and a bustling sales office taking a lot of incoming calls, a variety of solutions was needed to keep everyone in touch.

The Director in charge of sourcing telecoms is Tim Bunn, who also heads up the company's sales function. Tim had previous experience of dealing with multiple suppliers and was adamant that he only wanted to deal with one supplier. He was also keen to use a smaller, specialist company rather than a large network operator. Tim talked to a number of potential telecoms suppliers before deciding on Timico.

"Having previously sourced telecoms services from huge organisations such as BT, I was al too familiar with being treated as just another number. With PCS, I was determined hat things would be different and wanted a supplier who could give us the same kind of personal service we offer to our own customers."

The solution provided

PCS's nominated Timico Corporate Sales Manager spent time at its head office talking to Tim and other members of staff about the day-to-day operations of the business and the communication services required to help things run as smoothly as possible.

He put forward a proposal to satisfy their existing and future communication needs and then worked closely with Tim and the provisioning team at Timico to manage the roll-out of the new services.

"I was impressed with the approach taken by Timico in taking the time to understand our requirements rather than second guessing what was actually required, as many other companies do."

Outbound communication

A carrier pre-select (CPS) and line rental service was set up at the Croydon office, offering an alternative to carriers such as BT and providing outbound UK and international calls and monthly line rental at considerably lower rates.

With CPS, there is no need for a business to change its telephone numbers and programming is done at the local exchange with no complicated changes to a customer's PBX. All PCS's calls and line rental charges are invoiced by Timico.

Email and internet access

With five regular email and internet users at Head Office, a 512k DSL connection was the most cost-effective way to provide fixed cost, shared access for multiple users.

Free inbound calls

With a growing customer base and some high profile local advertising planned, Timico recommended that PCS take up an 0800 number for inbound calls. This means that any potential or existing customers wanting to contact PCS can do so free of charge, with the aim of making PCS more likely to generate new business than any of its competitors using standard geographic numbers.

Future service requirements

With more and more staff working remotely and using their homes as a base, Tim feels there will be an increasing need for them to be able to call back to base and he is currently in discussion with Timico about providing CPS services on employees' home phones in addition to providing all staff with a mobile phone.

Why did PCS choose Timico?

With a number of different services being taken from Timico, Tim felt it was a great benefit to receive a single invoice at the end of each month, rather than the multiple bills he had received in the past.

"Timico's bills are clear, highly accurate and informative. We receive a bill in the post but can go online at any time and view further itemised breakdowns as and when we need them."

Since signing up with Timico in 2004, Tim has been very impressed by the quality of the customer service he has received.

"So many businesses say they're good at service, but it's rare to work with a company whose people consistently do what they promise to do. I didn't think it was possible in telecoms. The service I've received has been absolutely superb."