Make personal calls during work hours? Think twice!

You might want to think twice before making another personal call during work hours.

Companies can now buy a service that automatically analyses phone calls made by office staff, figures out which are for business and which are personal, and delivers a monthly list of repeat offenders¹ directly to top management.

"If you're making a 30-second call every morning at about 9 a.m. and the number doesn't match those used by your colleagues then we can guess fairly accurately² that's your spouse," said Robert Picton, product manager at South African IT firm Dimension Data.

Picton says that although other IT companies offer call analysis technology, Didata is the first to translate that information for managers.

Didata says a company can cut its phone costs by 10-15 percent by using the 'Guardian³' monthly service, not to mention hours of manpower saved through increased productivity.

Employees might bristle⁴ at the thought of managers monitoring calls. But Didata says the system focuses only on those who run up huge bills or spend hours of work time on personal calls, and says no one listens in to the calls themselves.

"Obviously it is acceptable to make a few calls home," said Picton. "And this is about the minority who are spending 12 hours a month on the phone for non-business purposes and running up bills of $114.7.