For smaller ISPs seeking an inexpensive way to move beyond basic spreadsheets and accounting software, ISP Billing Software may have the perfect solution.

by Jeff Goldman [October 15, 2001]

Michael T. Rocharde is President of the appropriately named ISP Billing Software LLC, based in Costa Rica. He's been developing software of one kind or another for twenty years now: the software he currently offers was initially developed as a one-time solution for an ISP in London six years ago, but the product proved so popular that he decided to promote it on its own.

At the time, Rocharde was living in Las Vegas, but he's since moved to Costa Rica. Why? Because he could. "My wife and I were ready for a change in pace," he said. "We've spent a lot of time down here, and we love it. We decided that the business could be run from here as easily as it can from the States, and why not? This is a real Central American paradise."

The first commercial release of ISP Billing Software was Version 4, made available in January of 1995. Since then, they've been releasing a new version about every eight months. Version 10, the latest release, adds a simpler, more colorful interface; more flexible security settings; and the ability to handle multiple companies within the same program.

ISP Billing Software sales@isp-billing.com

The new releases, Rocharde explains, are prompted by customer requests. "I've been developing it almost constantly, just adding feature after feature based on what users want," he said. "That makes us very different from the competition, because they build a feature set that they think the customers want, and if the way that you do business doesn't match their feature set, you either have to change your business or you have to find something else."

Instead, he says, ISP Billing Software was developed to focus on flexibility. "What I've done is build it so that it will allow them to work in any way they want," Rocharde said. "If they want to bill daily, fine; if they want to bill monthly, fine; if they want to prorate some and not prorate others, fine. They can do whatever they want. We don't make them make changes to their business: we just make their business better."

According to Rocharde, about 170 ISPs are currently using the software. "It's a very small market, and we've got a small percentage of a small market," he said. "But the clients we've got are really happy with the software, and that's more than can be said for many others."

Beyond QuickBooks
ISP Billing Software is marketed as a perfect solution for ISPs looking for something to help them move beyond QuickBooks or any other generic accounting program (left). ISP Billing's target customer is really any small to medium sized ISP serving up to 100,000 customers. And if you grow beyond 100,000 customers, Rocharde is quick to note, you won't be limited by the capabilities of the software-it's just that ISPs serving more than 100,000 customers are likely to want to invest in a more expensive solution.

The program uses FileMaker Pro for its database, and can operate on any Macintosh or Windows OS. "We've been using FileMaker Pro since '87, and I wouldn't use anything else," Rocharde said. "The reason I feel so strongly about that is because it's incredibly fast: you can pull up a record instantly out of a huge database. It allows us to build in flexibility and make changes almost on the fly."

According to Rocharde, that kind of speed and simplicity are ISP Billing Software's main selling points. "It's fast, reliable, and very stable," he said. "There's no complicated configuration that has to be done by the ISP. It can be used by somebody who's fairly computer-illiterate, so you don't have to pay them a lot of money to do your billing."

Another key asset of the solution is the ability to handle multiple companies. "There are a lot of ISPs that have been buying out smaller ones," Rocharde said. "This allows them to roll them all into one operation and still keep all the accounting and everything separate: they can look at it overall, or they can look at each individual business as a profit center. It's just part of the flexibility."

Invoices are processed automatically on a daily basis, and most credit card processing systems are supported. You can arrange for automatic emailing of reminder letters to delinquent accounts, and you can track any problems or issues on a per-customer basis (right). The software offers a range of reporting options, both in terms of projections and historical data.

ISP Billing's pricing structure offers one key advantage over just about every other solution out there: there's no per-user fee. You pay $1350 for an unlimited number of users, and after that, there's a nominal fee for upgrades. "The cost of getting into it is minimal," Rocharde said. "There's no per user cost, there's no annual license fee: just a small one-time expenditure and that's the end of it."

Installation is simply a matter of downloading and launching the software. Customization, if necessary, is offered at a low cost with a 48-hour turnaround and support is usually free. "We only ever charge for support when we are getting an inordinate number of calls, most of which could be answered by reading the manual," Rocharde said. "Typically, though, we get a few questions in the first couple of weeks of usage, and then we never hear from them again."

The whole package
George Jacobs is President of Techcomm USA, an Internet company based in Las Vegas, Nevada. After reaching about 5,000 users, he sold his first ISP, @wizard.com, to the Denver-based ViaWest Internet Services in April of last year. He's currently in the processing of setting up a new ISP called Sign of the Times, or SOTT.

Back in 1997, Jacobs says, he was pulling his hair out over the billing for @wizard.com. "I had moved to the point where I was using an Excel spreadsheet and doing it all manually," he said. "Michael came in and said, 'You're crazy.' I said, 'I'm not going to spend any money, and this is what I want to do.' He finally convinced me to give it a try, and I never looked back."

He did look at a few other options before settling on ISP Billing Software, but he wasn't able to find the functionality he was looking for anywhere else (left). "There was nothing out there that had the whole package," Jacobs said. "I was billing to people's phone bill accounts, and credit cards, and emailing invoices; and some of them had one or the other, but not all. He put it all in there for me."

It was during the sale of @wizard.com that Jacobs realized what a solid solution he had. "We went through a very detailed audit, and I found only one or two accounts out of close to 5,000 that weren't being properly billed-and then when we dug in, we found somebody had entered the information wrong," he said. "I think that's an excellent, excellent recommendation for it."

In the end, Jacob says, it's Rocharde's responsiveness to user requests that's made him particularly happy with the solution. "Of course, nothing is 100 percent perfect," he said. "But at this point, anything that I would have changed, I would have gotten to Michael about in the past and he would have changed. It's pretty much just the way I wanted it."

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