Layla UsmanThe Bill Nobody Looks at Closely Enough
There is a category of business expense that most Australian business owners pay every month without ever properly scrutinising it. It arrives as a collection of invoices — sometimes from two or three different providers — it gets filed, it gets paid, and it mostly gets ignored.
We are talking about business communications costs. The phone system. The mobile plans. The internet connection. The 1300 number. Sometimes a separate fax line that nobody has used in three years but is still being paid for.
For the average Australian SMB, these costs add up to $800 to $3,000 per month — sometimes more. And in the vast majority of cases, a significant portion of that spend is either unnecessary, overpriced, or both. Not because the business is being reckless, but because they set up their communications infrastructure years ago, signed contracts, and simply never revisited it.
This blog is a practical, number-driven guide to identifying where your business is overspending on communications — and exactly how BroadConnect has helped over 950 Australian businesses reduce their combined communications spend by up to 70%, while simultaneously upgrading their capabilities.
| 💬 Real Client Example: ‘The price quoted to change from a Telstra account to BroadConnect is almost half of what we have been paying. Within a day we had all changed over without any problems and the changeover took less than 30 minutes.’ — Jennifer Beemsterboer, Machinery Forum Pty Ltd |
1. Where Australian Businesses Are Overspending on Communications
Before we get to solutions, let’s identify the problem precisely. There are five areas where Australian businesses consistently overspend — often without realising it.
| Overspend Area | Typical Cause | Potential Saving with BroadConnect |
|---|---|---|
| Legacy phone system costs | Old ISDN lines, on-premise PBX maintenance, high per-minute call charges — set up years ago and never reviewed | 30–70% on total phone system costs |
| Retail mobile plans | Buying Telstra or Optus mobile plans at full retail price — often on 24-month contracts with data that goes unused each month | 15–35% on mobile fleet spend |
| Wasted data spend | Individual SIM data allowances where heavy users exceed limits (paying overage) and light users waste allocation every month | 15–30% through data pooling and Databank |
| Multiple provider overhead | Paying two or three providers separately — each with their own contract, admin, billing cycle and support relationship | Consolidation saves admin time + eliminates duplicate charges |
| Internet plan mismatch | Consumer-grade NBN shared with residential users, or over-specced enterprise circuits that exceed actual needs | Right-sizing saves 20–50% on internet costs |
Most businesses have at least two of these overspend areas active simultaneously. The compounding effect of addressing all five is where the 70% headline savings figure comes from — and it is not unusual for a BroadConnect review to uncover savings that pay for the new service many times over in the first year alone.
2. Saving on Your Phone System: The Biggest Single Opportunity
For most Australian businesses, the largest single communications cost is the phone system — and it is also the area of greatest potential saving. The transition from a legacy ISDN or on-premise PBX system to a BroadConnect cloud phone system eliminates several cost layers simultaneously.
What You Are Currently Paying (Typical Legacy Setup)
| Cost Item | Typical Monthly Cost (10-user office) |
|---|---|
| ISDN or PSTN line rental (per channel) | $80 – $250/month |
| PBX system maintenance contract | $100 – $400/month |
| Per-minute call charges (STD, mobile, IDD) | $50 – $200/month |
| Hardware costs (amortised) | $50 – $150/month |
| IT support for on-premise system | $50 – $200/month |
| Typical total | $330 – $1,200/month |
What You Pay With BroadConnect Cloud Phone System
| Cost Item | Monthly Cost |
|---|---|
| BroadConnect hosted phone system (per user) | $35/user/month |
| Call charges (included or minimal pay-per-use) | Low — often included in plan |
| ISDN / PSTN line rental | $0 — eliminated entirely |
| PBX maintenance contract | $0 — cloud-managed by BroadConnect |
| Hardware maintenance | $0 — no on-premise hardware |
| Total (10 users) | ~$350/month |
| Monthly saving vs. legacy | $0 – $850/month saved |
| Annual saving | Up to $10,200/year |
Beyond the direct cost saving, a BroadConnect cloud phone system adds capabilities — remote work softphones, call recording, analytics, voicemail-to-email, Microsoft Teams integration — that a legacy system simply cannot offer. You spend less and get more. Explore the hosted phone system.
3. Saving on Mobile Plans: The Wholesale Advantage
If your business buys mobile plans directly from Telstra or Optus at retail prices, you are paying a significant premium that simply is not necessary. BroadConnect is an authorised wholesale reseller of both Telstra and Optus mobile capacity — the same networks, the same coverage, at meaningfully lower prices.
| Comparison Point | Retail Carrier (Direct) | BroadConnect Wholesale |
|---|---|---|
| Entry plan (10GB, 4G, unlimited calls/SMS) | $35 – $45/SIM/month | $25/SIM/month (Telstra S Plan) |
| Mid-range plan (25GB, 4G) | $50 – $65/SIM/month | $35/SIM/month (Telstra M Plan) |
| Large plan (45GB, 4G + IDD) | $60 – $80/SIM/month | $45/SIM/month (Telstra L Plan) |
| 5G plan (120GB, unlimited IDD) | $80 – $105/SIM/month | $65/SIM/month (Telstra XL Plan) |
| Data bank / rollover | Rarely included | 500GB Databank — standard on all Telstra plans |
| Contract flexibility | 12–24 month lock-in | No lock-in — add/remove anytime |
| Account management | Carrier call centre | Dedicated Australian account manager |
| Integration with phone system | Not available | Full integration with BroadConnect cloud PBX |
We have worked with BroadConnect for several years now and their service has been amazing. When we transitioned our office phones and internett to BC, the team was quick to answer queries and gave regular updates during the process. The support team is always quick to respond to queries and provide updates to our phone system and provide solutions to any issues we have.
What This Means for a 10-Person Mobile Fleet
| Scenario | Retail Carrier Cost | BroadConnect Cost | Annual Saving |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 SIMs on mid-range 4G plan | $50–$65/SIM = $500–$650/month | $35/SIM = $350/month | $1,800 – $3,600/year |
| 10 SIMs on large 4G plan | $60–$80/SIM = $600–$800/month | $45/SIM = $450/month | $1,800 – $4,200/year |
| 10 SIMs on 5G XL plan | $80–$105/SIM = $800–$1,050/month | $65/SIM = $650/month | $1,800 – $4,800/year |
| 20-SIM mixed fleet | $60 avg = $1,200/month | $40 avg = $800/month | $4,800/year |
These are conservative estimates — many businesses save more once data pooling eliminates wasted allocation. See all BroadConnect mobile plans at broadconnect.com.au/services/mobile.
4. Saving on Data: The Hidden Cost of Wasted Mobile Allocation
One of the most significant — and most overlooked — sources of mobile spend waste is data that is paid for but never used. When each staff member has an individual data allowance and light users consistently leave gigabytes unused each month, that wasted data represents pure cost with zero return.
BroadConnect eliminates this waste through two mechanisms: Optus data pooling and Telstra’s 500GB Databank.
| Team of 10 — Individual Plans vs. Pooled/Databank | Individual Plans | BroadConnect Pooled / Databank |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly data allocated (10 × 25GB) | 250GB allocated | 250GB allocated |
| Typical actual usage | 170GB used — 80GB wasted | 170GB used — 80GB banked or pooled |
| Overage charges (2 heavy users exceed) | $30–$60 in overage charges | $0 — pool covers the overage |
| Wasted data cost | 80GB × ~$15/GB effective = waste | $0 — data saved in Databank or shared pool |
| Monthly effective saving | — | Approx. $40–$100/month on a 10-SIM fleet |
| Annual saving from data optimisation | — | $480 – $1,200/year — from data alone |
| 📊 The Data Waste Reality: BroadConnect analysis of business mobile accounts transitioning from retail carrier plans consistently finds 20–35% of total data allocation going unused each month. On a 20-SIM fleet, eliminating that waste through pooling or Databank can save $1,000–$2,500 per year — before any other changes. |
5. Saving Through Consolidation: One Provider, One Invoice, Less Overhead
There is a cost to complexity that rarely appears on any invoice — but is very real in terms of time, administrative burden and the gaps that emerge when multiple providers are not properly integrated.
| Multiple Separate Providers (Current Reality) | Single BroadConnect Provider (New Reality) |
|---|---|
| 3 separate monthly invoices to reconcile — phone, mobile, internet | One consolidated monthly invoice — everything in one line |
| 3 separate support relationships — hold music for each | One account manager — one call, one person who knows your setup |
| Phone system and mobile not integrated — separate silos | Phone system and mobile integrate — business number rings on mobile |
| Internet not optimised for VoIP — choppy calls | Business internet configured for VoIP — crisp, reliable calls |
| Disputes between providers when something goes wrong | BroadConnect owns the whole stack — one throat to choke |
| Contracts expiring at different times — hard to coordinate review | All services on aligned terms — reviewed together, renewed together |
| No visibility across the combined communications picture | Unified analytics — call volumes, data usage, internet performance in one view |
| Multiple pricing reviews needed — significant management time | One pricing review covers everything — efficient and strategic |
The hidden cost of managing multiple providers — the time spent on support calls, invoice queries, contract renewals, and trying to get Provider A to talk to Provider B when something goes wrong — is typically 5–10 hours of management time per month for a medium-sized business. At an average manager’s cost, that is $500–$1,500 of time every month that consolidation with BroadConnect eliminates.
6. Saving on Internet: Right-Sizing for Your Actual Needs
Business internet is frequently either significantly over-specified or significantly under-specified — both of which cost money in different ways.
| Internet Overspend Scenario | What Is Happening | BroadConnect Solution & Saving |
|---|---|---|
| Consumer NBN on a business connection | Paying residential prices but suffering business-level consequences — no SLA, no static IP, poor performance during business hours | Switch to Business NBN from $85/month — better performance, SLA, static IP at a modest upgrade cost that pays back in productivity |
| Enterprise fibre for a small office that doesn’t need it | Paying $500–$1,500/month for dedicated fibre when Business NBN at $85–$200/month would fully meet actual requirements | Right-size to Business NBN with 4G/5G failover — save $300–$1,300/month while maintaining reliability |
| Old ADSL or legacy copper connection | Paying legacy pricing for a slow, unreliable connection — and then paying productivity costs when it underperforms | Upgrade to Business NBN — often the same or lower cost, dramatically better performance |
| No internet failover — full cost of downtime when it occurs | Not paying for redundancy — but paying far more in downtime costs when the primary fails | 4G/5G failover added for modest monthly cost — eliminates $9,000+/hour downtime cost |
| Multiple internet services per site without SD-WAN | Paying for two internet lines per site without intelligently managing them — redundancy without efficiency | SD-WAN manages multiple connections intelligently — gets full value from each circuit, adds failover intelligence |
BroadConnect’s free connectivity assessment reviews your current internet spend and requirements and identifies whether you are over-specced, under-specced or just poorly configured — and what the right solution looks like for your actual workload.
7. Real Savings by Business Size: What to Expect When You Switch
Let’s put real numbers to what a complete BroadConnect communications review and migration typically delivers for Australian businesses of different sizes. These figures are based on typical scenarios — actual savings will depend on your current setup.
| Business Profile | Current Monthly Spend (Est.) | BroadConnect Monthly Spend (Est.) | Monthly Saving | Annual Saving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Solo practitioner / 1–2 staffCloud phone + 2 mobile SIMs + Business NBN | $350 – $550/month | ~$180 – $250/month | $100 – $300/month | $1,200 – $3,600/year |
| Small business (5 staff)Phone system + 5 SIMs + NBN | $600 – $1,000/month | ~$350 – $500/month | $250 – $500/month | $3,000 – $6,000/year |
| Medium business (10 staff)Phone system + 10 SIMs + NBN + 1300 number | $1,000 – $1,800/month | ~$600 – $900/month | $400 – $900/month | $4,800 – $10,800/year |
| Growing firm (20 staff)Phone system + 20 SIMs + NBN + SD-WAN + 1300 | $2,000 – $3,500/month | ~$1,100 – $1,800/month | $800 – $1,700/month | $9,600 – $20,400/year |
| Multi-site (30+ staff, 3 offices)Full stack across all sites | $4,000 – $7,000/month | ~$2,200 – $3,500/month | $1,500 – $3,500/month | $18,000 – $42,000/year |
These are indicative ranges based on typical Australian business scenarios. Your actual savings will depend on your current contracts, usage patterns and the specific BroadConnect solutions that suit your needs. Contact BroadConnect for a personalised cost comparison.
| 🏆 The compounding effect: When you save on phone system, mobile, data waste, provider overhead and internet simultaneously, the total saving is always larger than the sum of the individual parts. A 20-staff business saving $800/month on phones, $300/month on mobiles and $200/month on internet is saving $15,600/year — before factoring in the 5–10 hours/month of management time also recovered. |
8. The Better Capabilities You Get at a Lower Price
The most important point in this entire blog is one that most cost-comparison articles miss: when you switch your communications to BroadConnect, you do not just spend less. You get more. Every area where cost is reduced, capability is simultaneously upgraded.
| What You Give Up | What You Gain at Lower Cost | BroadConnect Service |
|---|---|---|
| Old ISDN phone system with basic call routing | Cloud PBX with call recording, analytics, softphones, voicemail-to-email, IVR, Teams integration, remote work capability | |
| Retail Telstra/Optus mobile at full price, locked in 24 months | Wholesale Telstra/Optus SIMs — same network, lower price, no lock-in, data pooling, 500GB Databank, fleet management | |
| Consumer NBN shared with residential users, no SLA | Business NBN with SLA, static IP, priority support, QoS for VoIP, failover option | |
| Geographic phone number (02, 03) — location-tied, no routing | 1300 national number with intelligent call routing, analytics, time-of-day rules, campaign tracking | |
| No after-hours coverage — calls go to voicemail | AI agent answers after hours, books appointments, captures leads, handles FAQs 24/7 | |
| Basic consumer router with no business security | Managed firewall, SD-WAN, VPN, intrusion detection — enterprise security for SMB price |
This is the BroadConnect value equation: lower cost, better capability, Australian support. Not a trade-off. Not a compromise. A genuine upgrade at every level.
9. How to Get Your Free BroadConnect Communications Cost Review
BroadConnect offers every Australian business a free, no-obligation communications cost review — a structured audit of your current phone, mobile and internet spend that identifies exactly where you are overpaying and what a BroadConnect solution would cost in comparison.
Here is what the review process looks like:
- Gather your current invoices: Phone system, mobile fleet, internet, 1300 number — last 2–3 months of invoices from all providers
- Book a free review: Call 1300 880 330 or visit broadconnect.com.au to schedule a 30-minute call with a BroadConnect account manager
- BroadConnect analyses your spend: We review your current costs, usage patterns, contract terms and requirements
- We present a side-by-side comparison: Your current costs vs. BroadConnect costs — specific, itemised, no estimates
- You decide: No pressure. If the numbers make sense, we migrate you in 14 days or less. If not, we part on good terms
The review costs you nothing. The information is yours to keep regardless of what you decide. And for most Australian businesses, the savings identified are substantial enough to make the decision straightforward. Book your free review at broadconnect.com.au/contact-us.
10. Frequently Asked Questions
Q: We are locked into contracts with our current providers. Does that prevent us from switching?
Not necessarily. BroadConnect can review your current contract terms and identify exit options — many businesses are closer to contract end than they realise. In some cases, the savings from switching immediately — even accounting for any exit fees — outweigh the cost of staying until the contract end. And for services not currently under contract, switching can begin immediately. Talk to BroadConnect about your contract situation.
Q: Will there be any service disruption when we switch?
BroadConnect manages migrations specifically to minimise or eliminate disruption. Phone number porting is coordinated to happen during a low-traffic window. Mobile SIM replacements are arranged so staff have new SIMs before old ones are disconnected. Internet migrations are timed for out-of-hours switchover where possible. Most BroadConnect clients report zero meaningful disruption — and several have specifically noted that the migration was the smoothest technology change their business had experienced.
Q: We have tried to negotiate with our current carrier before and got nowhere. Is this different?
Carriers negotiate on price within the constraints of their retail pricing structure — and those constraints are significant. BroadConnect’s ability to offer lower prices is not the result of negotiation — it is structural. We buy capacity at wholesale rates and pass those savings to clients. No amount of negotiation with a retail carrier will get you to wholesale pricing. See the difference for yourself with a free cost comparison.
Q: Does saving money mean compromising on network quality or call reliability?
No — this is the most important question to answer clearly. BroadConnect’s mobile plans run on the actual Telstra and Optus networks — the same infrastructure as direct retail plans. Our cloud phone system is hosted on carrier-grade infrastructure with a 99.99% uptime SLA. Our business internet comes with business SLAs and priority fault response. Lower price does not mean lower quality — it means smarter purchasing through a wholesale channel.
Q: How long does a full migration to BroadConnect typically take?
For a complete migration covering phone system, mobile fleet and internet, BroadConnect typically completes the full transition within 14 to 21 business days from agreement. Individual services can go live sooner — mobile SIMs can often be active within a week, cloud phone systems within 7–10 days. Your BroadConnect account manager will provide a specific timeline based on your current setup and the services being migrated.
Conclusion: The Best Time to Review Your Communications Costs Was Last Year. The Second Best Time Is Now.
Every month your business continues on overpriced legacy arrangements is another month of avoidable cost. For a medium-sized Australian business, that can mean $5,000 to $10,000 or more per year in unnecessary spend — money that could go to staff, marketing, technology or simply staying on the right side of a tight budget.
The businesses that have already made the switch to BroadConnect consistently report two things: they are surprised by how much they were overpaying, and they are surprised by how simple the switch was. The combination of lower costs, better capabilities and Australian support is genuinely difficult to argue against once the numbers are laid out side by side.
Book your free BroadConnect communications cost review today. It takes 30 minutes, costs nothing, and for most Australian businesses, it is the most valuable call they make this year. Visit broadconnect.com.au/contact-us or call 1300 880 330.
References & Further Reading
- BroadConnect — Free Cost Comparison & Review
- BroadConnect Hosted Cloud Phone System
- BroadConnect Business Mobile SIM Plans
- BroadConnect Business NBN Internet Plans
- BroadConnect 1300 & 1800 Inbound Services
- BroadConnect AI Agent Solutions
- BroadConnect Managed Network & Cybersecurity
- Australian Competition and Consumer Commission — Telecommunications Market
- Australian Communications and Media Authority — Business Telecommunications
- BroadConnect — Full Services Overview
| Find Out Exactly How Much You Are Overpaying.Free 30-minute BroadConnect cost review. Real numbers. No obligation. Australian team.Phone System · Mobile Fleet · Internet · 1300 Numbers · AI AgentsCall 1300 880 330 | Mon–Fri 8am–5pm | hello@broadconnect.com.au>>> Book Your Free Review — broadconnect.com.au/contact-us <<< |
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📞 Book a Consultation or email us at hello@broadconnect.com.au to get started.
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