Decimal Rounding
What is Decimal Rounding?
Along with Billing Minimum / Increments carriers also use cost rounding to manipulate the cost of each call and the net effective rate you are billed. In call centers, where vast majority of calls are under 30 seconds, this can make a significant impact on the overall bill. If we use an example of a 7 second call billed at the rate of $0.015 per minute, we can see that decimal rounding can increase the net effective rate by over 470% or more:
| Rounded To: | Cost of Call | Net Effective Rate |
| 2nd decimal | $0.01 | $0.0857 |
| 3rd decimal | $0.002 | $0.0171 |
| 4th decimal | $0.0018 | $0.0154 |
| 5th decimal | $0.00175 | $0.0150 |
Based on the example above, it is clear that rounding can make an otherwise ‘great’ rate, offered by your carrier, actually be a mediocre rate at best. We have seen CDRs from other carriers where billing was rounded to 2 decimals. The minimum charge per call was $0.01 (1 cent). This may not seem like much but in contact centers where median call duration may well be 7 seconds, this type of rounding increased the overall bill by 20-30%. Star Telecom rounds all calls at 5 decimals ensuring your net effective rate IS the rate we quote.