At the same time, telecommuters need some kind of help desk service once they are up and running. A telecommuter with broken equipment is out of production, a situation that's more serious than a broken copying machine at the office. At a minimum, Beckman recommends setting up an answering machine so that employees can call, leave a message about their problem, and get a response during the day. Network protocols can also affect the cost of telecommuting. Since they dictate the way in which remote access users connect to an office LAN or host computer, using the wrong ones can waste bandwidth and drive up phone bills.
Security is another cost element for telecommuting.
Virtually all remote access products provide some form of password security, but governments still need to set policies and strategies for user identification, communications privacy and access control. While telecommuting can deliver real financial benefits, the use of technology can eat into those returns if not implemented properly. Plan ahead, say the experts, and those hidden costs can be reduced. Unfortunately in government, even the best laid plans for using technology and telecommuting can go nowhere when they run into attitudes of indifference. After funding its feasibility study on telecommuting, the San Luis Obispo Council of Governments decided that telecommuting was an issue best left to the private sector to solve.