Comparison of standard vs e-mail billing
Environmental Impact
Paper production has always been one of the predominant contributing factors to
climate change due to the numerous environmental impacts throughout the fabrication
process: from tree consumption and global deforestation, to energy intensive mill
processing, to its disposal and decomposition in refuse heaps and landfills. This
is why Unicom has chosen to offer its customers an e-billing service.
When taking into account that the paper industry is the single largest industrial
consumer of water and uses more water to produce a tonne of product than any other
industry on the planet, the environmental cost really begins to add up.
Transport of the wood and paper, often over large distances, including delivering
the post itself adds further to the paper production process carbon footprint. When
comparing the energy intensive processes involved in paper production opposed to
the minimal energy necessary to provide e-billing, the only sensible option is to
sign up to Unicom e-billing.
Standard billing process involves:
E-billing process involves:
What is a PDF?
A PDF is a document that will allow you to open and view an identical replica of
your monthly invoice. To view the PDF you will need Adobe Acrobat. If you haven’t
already installed Adobe Acrobat, simply click on get acrobat below for a simple
download.
Get Adobe Acrobat
E-billing FAQs
Q: What is online billing and how does it work?
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A:
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Online billing gives you access to your monthly Unicom invoices online and as a
downloadable PDF file via the Unicom Customer Zone, all you have to do is register.
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Q: How much does online billing cost?
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A:
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Nothing. Online billing is available free of charge to all Unicom customers.
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Q: Will I be charged for full itemisation?
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A:
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No, a benefit of online billing is having access to a fully itemised bill at no
extra cost. Not only that but you will be able to search, sort and filter your bill
allowing you to see the information you need to regarding calls made.
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Q: How do I register for online billing?
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A:
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By simply accessing the Unicom Customer
Zone and clicking on the register tab Once you have signed up you will not
only have access to the last 12 months worth of invoices (where applicable) but
you can also benefit from the other Customer Zone tools available, such as Total
Recall and the online fault reporter.
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Q: Do I have to change the way I pay my bill?
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A:
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No. As long as your Direct Debit is set up your monthly invoice amount will be taken
from your bank automatically.
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Q: Is my account information secure?
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A:
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Yes. The PDF copy of your bill will only be able to be accessed by you.
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Benefits of online billing
- It provides regular and secure access to your bills.
- Your bills and all of the information on your account are
available at the touch of a button.
- You can view bills online or download as a PDF file.
- Viewing bills online allows you a range of tools (such
as sorting and filtering) to analyse your bill.
- You gain access to other benefits of the Customer Zone.
- Reduces paper handling for staff.
- You save £1.50 avoiding a paper invoice charge.
- •You receive full itemisation free of charge. This would
normally cost you £2.50 per month with paper invoicing. Coupled with the saving
on the paper invoice charge you save £4.00 a month!
Trees saved
Currently Unicom provides telecommunication services for around 80,000 business
customers, each one of which requires a monthly invoice detailing their service
charges. For each of those customers an average of 4 pages will be used in a monthly
invoice including the envelope. This equates to using 320,000 sheets of paper per
month, and works out at over 3.8 million sheets of paper per year used on invoices
alone.
Recent figures show that the average tree can produce 8333.3 sheets of paper*, which
equates to 36 trees worth of paper used every month, or over 450 trees per annum.
If every Unicom customer signed up for e-billing, trees covering an area the size
of Trafalgar Square could be saved from deforestation every year.
*Conservatree
E-billing Itemisation
A fully itemised paper invoice currently costs £4.00 per month. A fully itemised
online invoice is free of charge. Not only do you save £4.00 per month, but you
can also sort, filter and search your call information as well as gain access to
a suit of account management tools. And of course, as well as making a monthly saving
you will also helping to reduce your carbon footprint.
Go Green
Online Billing
In today’s ever more environmentally conscious society, it is important to look
at the way our businesses operate and contribute towards reducing their carbon footprint.
As the UK’s fastest growing telecoms company, Unicom is striving to reduce the resources
used to send out customer invoices each month. We are actively asking all customers
to do their part in protecting the environment by switching to online billing by
signing up to the Customer Zone. Using this free service you will be able to access
12 months of invoices in a fully itemised format and can download a .PDF version
if required.
To date, 47% of Unicom customers have switched from receiving a paper invoice, saving
150,000 sheets of paper a month or over 1.8 million sheets per annum. This equates
to saving nearly 220 trees per year!
Click here for a comparison of standard billing
vs online billing
Online billing is the new and environmentally friendly way you can access your Unicom
bill. Instead of receiving a paper invoice through the post, all you need to do
is log into the Customer Zone where you will be able to access your bill in an online
format or download it as a PDF file file.
This offer is open to all Unicom customers and is completely free of charge.
As well as accessing your invoices you will benefit from access to Total Recall
Call Reports (tools to analyse your telephone line usage), plus the ability to test
your line for faults and arrange engineer visits if required.
Click here to sign up for Customer Zone.