What to do?

[DAFTJOHN]

So I have a big decision to make by tomorrow - to move job or not.

At the minute I've been at my current place for 9 years - worked my way up and feel part of the business - 300 odd employess but owned by a larger company, who itself has just been bought by Vodafone. We're currently involved in re-selling our Data Network, phone lines, ADSL, Large private Networks and call minutes - obv Vodafone isn't really in this market and I can see them either selling us, or taking 2 years to start being competitive. Another potentially positive is if I'm paid off I would get a years salary.

Over the past 3-4 years we've been lacking innovation as a company and our commercials aren't as sharp as they could be - around 4-6k more per year than our competitors, which is big money as I sell via partners/re-sellers who then sell on and add their add ons, so their take is normally the lowest price. My team and manager are excellent but the rest of my colleagues are not as sharp.

This leads me on to be offered a role with a Telecom Carrier, so they own and operate the Network and have more control over product, price and market cap
, where as we re-sell our parents services and are always one step away from having control. The new company, they've been leading the way in terms of online portals/ordering/management. They have a bigger Network and are loking to increase 100 fold in 5 years and also double the revenue in 2-3 years....so are looking at a big push in the market.

At present I'm all over the UK but the new place would have me and only me in Scotland and NE England. The way I operate is usually moving voice bases from say BT to us and by doing this the partner gets more margin but there isn't much in the way of me helping them strategically as its a fairly transactional sale. I don't get the option to sell other things as our pricing is out. The new role should see me being much more involved with my parthers - allowing us to both develop over the years.....but the fear is it all goes wrong and I'm left not hitting target and getting no cash.....so do I stay where I am and see what happens or move on and let me control the sales by having access to a larger portfolio and better costs....:confused:

[mowgli]

any ideas why vodafone bought them if they aren't in that sort of market???

usually an acquisition is to either expand into a certain market, or to grab one particular contract as a foot in the door with a customer, then they shut the newly purchased firm down..

as for your potential new employer, wtf does all that stuff mean in plain easy to understand luddite speak?? do you sell commercial contracts for phone line useage?? cos there literally thousands of companies doing that, and to me,their growth figures are rather optimistic considering the rise of skype type systems, email & all sorts of other ways of communicating whilst in a recession..

but i'm only going on what you have just put, & the new people might just have something brilliant up their sleeves & might just be the next big thing..

only you can decide... is the package good? do you know anyone from your 'old' place who works there ? if so, can't you get an inside line on what's what?

[DAFTJOHN]

any ideas why vodafone bought them if they aren't in that sort of market???

usually an acquisition is to either expand into a certain market, or to grab one particular contract as a foot in the door with a customer, then they shut the newly purchased firm down..

as for your potential new employer, wtf does all that stuff mean in plain easy to understand luddite speak?? do you sell commercial contracts for phone line useage?? cos there literally thousands of companies doing that, and to me,their growth figures are rather optimistic considering the rise of skype type systems, email & all sorts of other ways of communicating whilst in a recession..

but i'm only going on what you have just put, & the new people might just have something brilliant up their sleeves & might just be the next big thing..

only you can decide... is the package good? do you know anyone from your 'old' place who works there ? if so, can't you get an inside line on what's what?

I work for THUS, who were Scottish Telecom - we're owned by Cable and Wireless who we're bought by Voda on Monday. They bought us, I feel for our Network. With the rise in mobile smartphones they have a massive amount of data they need to shift and at the minute they don't have an internet provider or Network. They'd get both from us. They buy the Network from BT and Cable and Wireless just now. By buying us they get the Netowrk and International sub-sea cables. They paid 1bn for us and becase we've performed poorly we have over 1bn in tax write offs - so they can buy us and also save over 1bn in corporate tax.....so it's saving them money buying us....plus they'll cancel their contracts with BT etc.

I'm mostly selling call minutes - so we supply all the re-sellers with no network, we should be selling them Data too but we're too expensive. The calls is a dying market though.

The new company is Talk Talk business (not the residential side).

Extra 6k basic and that translates to another 6k with commisison too but the chance of selling the right products in the new place are higher so more commission there.... I think.

[mowgli]

calls is a dying market for young people.. the grey pound is still important...older people use phones way more, and businesses rely totally on them.. a website is not a guarantee of a load of business...(example.. my brother has started up a log sales dept. we advertised on the web, and in local media, and got precisele 3/4 of sod all business, then we put a sign up at the end of the farm drive with our phone no. on.. people passing have noted it & rung us, they give us a card no over the phone, our card is on a land line & we have sold a lot of logs.. we also rang up all sorts of customers we already had & told them what we were doing & got loads of orders too)

our firm is 100% phone call prioritised, followed by fax & then email for getting orders... we use the broadband for mapping info & route planning, but its hardly a fast setup, nor does it need to be..

see what both sets of people are prepared to offer in terms of job security

[DAFTJOHN]

Yep, you're right - there are so many ways to get business now.

My re-sellers tend to go after the business from the retailers and then buy from me wholesale.

Don't think I'll get assurances from either - new one is 3 month probation but on thinking, if I can't sell to the whole of Scotland and the NE of England maybe I'm not cut out for it!

I could keep trundling along where I am but don't think that's doing me any favours - especailly in a dying market.

Cheers for the comments

[Lee H]

They paid 1bn for us and becase we've performed poorly we have over 1bn in tax write offs - so they can buy us and also save over 1bn in corporate tax.....so it's saving them money buying us....

They don't save 1bn in Corporation Tax, they will only save 24% of this as that is the large company tax rate at the moment.

[DAFTJOHN]

They don't save 1bn in Corporation Tax, they will only save 24% of this as that is the large company tax rate at the moment.

That's right lee, we have just over 4bn so they'll get the benefit of 1bn

[Lee H]

Ah right, that's some serious losses!

[DAFTJOHN]

It Is mate, they've written off a lot of the network and other assets