COMMON AUDIT ISSUES
UW-Madison Phone Usage Policy
As one of our most queried topics, you continue to visit our website for information about monitoring telephone bills and the campus policies on telephone and cellular phone usage. Considering the number of office telephone lines and cell phones across our campus, it is important employees understand the university policy and that departments routinely monitor phone usage for potential misuse. Our campus has a high level of turnover among staff, with new employees coming from a variety of backgrounds. Often what was acceptable use of phones in their previous employment is not acceptable at the UW-Madison.
Telephone Use Policy
Follow this link for the official UW-Madison Telephone Usage Policy provided by DoIT Voice Services.
Cellular Phone Use Policy
Follow this link for the official UW-Madison Cellular Service/Phone Policy provided by DoIT Voice Services.
Phone Use Monitoring
Because of the delay we experience between usage and billing for long distance and cellular charges, it is important billing be promptly reviewed when received. This is critical in the case of calling cards and cell service where card numbers or cell phones can be stolen and misuse can result in significant financial liability for a department. Monitoring should be done by someone familiar with a departments activities and in the context of "what is" the role of the employees using the phone(s).
We typically review to determine if:
the destinations called reflect the type of business the phone user typically conducts?
calls are made before/after normal business hours (7:45 - 4:30) or on weekends/holidays? Appropriateness of calls made after "normal" business hours may depend on the activities and operating hours of the department.
numerous long-distance calls are made to in-state locations not within the local dialing area or out of state/country? Calls made to cities where universities or the federal government is located may not be unusual.
there are lengthy calls, especially exceeding 15 minutes? When linked to one of the above factors, these become increasingly suspect.
If you identify a problem, it's also important to look beyond the month in which the problem is discovered. Depending on the normal volume of calls a phone generates, this can be done manually by reviewing all the bills for an extended period, or by obtaining an electronic copy of the calls on any given phone(s). Analyzing phone detail for periods beyond one month is possible by extracting detailed billing information from the data warehouse through InfoAccess.
While local calls are not charged to a department at this time, the volume by a phone should also be monitored. Employee time is one of our most important (and costly) resources; so taken in the context of what their duties are, a large number of non-Centrex calls could be another indicator of phone misuse.