Cameron...
That is the point of an OSS... an INTEGRATED solution that should help
operators realize a net gain from the expense of using it. :) I look
forward to seeing how your solution gets rated by WISPs over the next
year or so...
As operators increasingly succumb to the pressure and the need for UBB,
they will look to Wispmon & other key players in this area more & more.
On 4/25/2011 11:21 AM, Cameron Crum wrote:
I get your point and fully agree. Before we sold the network, we were
looking at an entire technology change and adding a lot more towers.
Capacity is everything these days as you point out. Metered billing is
certainly the way to go and we are trying to convince our Wispmon
customers of the benefits. As for the FCC reporting, they are still
stuck on the speed issue. They simply want what is offered to your
customers. Whether is is BS or not I guess is up to the conscience of
the reporter. Most of our Wispmon customers never thought of recording
actual speeds until they started using our software and it was
convenient for them to do so. Heck, if they use the work order system,
it is practically mandatory. One of the things we hope to do with
Wispmon is influence change in our industry to make people keep better
records and to have better procedures. If that leads to them realizing
how much money they are leaving on the table or even losing, then that
is a win for all of us. You can't begin to imagine the kind of data
formats we come across. It's astounding that some of these guys have
made it as long as they have. I would have given up if I had as hard a
time doing business as they have. Your business is fairly complex, but
at least you had accurate records in pretty much one place. We get
people with info spread across 5 different programs and can correlate
none of them.
Cameron
On Mon, Apr 25, 2011 at 12:55 PM, Marlon K. Schafer (509-982-2181)
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Thanks Cameron,
Back in 1999 when I first designed my billing plan I was literally
laughed at. Everyone knew that you sold speed, not capacity.
But tell me where else, anywhere, we pay for all you can eat, all
of the time? You don't buy your electricity by the voltage, you
buy it by the current used. Water doesn't come in pounds per
square inch, it's gallons used. Gas isn't in miles per hour etc.
etc. etc.
Why do we think we can sell internet by the speed and charge less
than a dedicated pipe costs? Times, they are a changin'....
We figure $x.00 per month in costs per customer per gigabit used.
In my case the cost per gig is about $.50 to $1.00 per unit
depending on my costs and how you run the numbers.
You must also figure in the amount of capacity you need each AP to
transfer during peak hours. No sense selling what you can't
deliver. We use the bit caps as a way to encourage the bandwidth
hogs to mess up someone else's service and keep my system running
at peak capabilities, not beyond them.
Our customers get 10 to 15 gigs per month with their accounts.
That's enough to do pretty much anything anyone wants to do except
movies and 24/7 internet radio (my parents have this problem :-).
For movies, the average movie is 1 to 3 gigs. An HD movie is 8 to
10. Netflix will simply figure out how much speed the customer
has available and send more data to suck it all up. It can use a
little or a lot. Usually a lot.
We also put a cap on our fiber customers. That's costing us users
these days. But I don't know what else to do, there is no money
in fiber anyway, then the customer wants to use $20 per month in
upstream fees on his $5.00 net account.
It's hard to figure out how to set all of this so that the average
customer can do what he needs to do, but you can afford to stay in
business.
We are certainly loosing some customers to the ones that don't
have caps. But those guys are going to go down in flames in the
next couple of years. They will HAVE to move to bit caps or raise
their rates. Even higher prices isn't going to help when there
isn't enough spectrum available to service the customers.
How many movies can you support at once across the average AP?
5? 10 at the most? I don't know about you guys but my break even
point is 10 subs per tower.
Does that help at all? If not, give me a call and I'll answer any
questions I can. 509.988.0260
marlon
----- Original Message -----
*From:* Cameron Crum <mailto:[email protected]>
*To:* WISPA General List <mailto:[email protected]>
*Sent:* Thursday, April 21, 2011 9:30 PM
*Subject:* Re: [WISPA] Bandwidth Usage Caps Examples?
Talk with Marlon at Odessa Office Equipment. He's been doing
bandwidth caps for years.
Cameron
On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 5:33 PM, Jason Novinger
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
They WISP that I work with actually implements no
bandiwdth caps and
uses it as a marketing strategy against the local cable
company. The
cable company uses the model of guaranteeing speeds, but
charging $x
for y GB over some arbitrary cap. They also provide a
package geared
for video that has no bandwidth caps, but also does not
guarantee any
speed.
Also, given AT&T's, the other local competitor, decision
to implement
caps, this WISP is the _only_ local provider that does
have any sort
of caps.
Holler off-list if you would like more specifics.
Jason
On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 2:04 PM, Dan
<[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
> We operate a small WISP plant that is becoming outmoded
and is scheduled
> to be replaced. Previously we have had a tiered pricing
scheme but the
> video explosion has had a severe impact on our existing
plant. We are
> looking at better future-proofing our next deployment
with the right
> model, which we believe to be either the
billed-for-heavy-usage model or
> block pricing.
>
> Without getting into discussion about the evils of
bandwidth caps too
> much, are there any examples of how WISP's are managing
this? Can
> anyone provide examples of end-user agreement language
pertaining to
> this, the simpler the better?
>
> Also, what software or management platform are people
using to monitor
> and automate billing of overages, etc?
>
> Feel free to reply to me off-list if needed.
>
> --Dan P.
>
>
>
>
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