ShopForT1.com today announced the grand launch of the long anticipated Real-Time quote engine designed to give the T1 shopper instant feedback, with 95% accurate loop pricing. Real time T1 prices have not existed until now. Many brokers claim to deliver real time information but the closest anyone has come to real time has been a page that you can check back and see vendors fill in prices the following 48 hours from when you entered your request.

"The real-time shopping model works" commented Adam Edwards, CEO of ShopForT1.com. "The travel industry is a perfect example of how the internet can enable everyday people to access very complicated databases. Now, we are pleased to bring instant gratification to those looking to price T1 lines." Apart from allowing people to research rates, ShopForT1.com also has a number of other unique features; most notably the ability to track leads referred by online affiliates and direct them to one of many part-time "closer" agents for personal care. This functionality allows ShopForT1.com to improve the shopping experience, opens the door for online affiliates to earn residual commissions by driving traffic, and manages professional part-time sales agents from all over the counrty.

"Many people have asked how exactly we figure out T1 pricing, since it is so sensitive to the geographic location of each customer with relation to the carriers' physical equipment. Our T1 Quote software is able to calculate the distance from any location in the continental United States to any of our providers' Points of Presence (POPs). From there, we use proprietary pricing algorithms to convert the distance into a price" commented Patrick Oborn, CTO of ShopForT1.com.

Like most telecommunications services DS3 prices (commonly known at T3) have been falling for the last few years. This is due to several factors. Competition has been heating up since deregulation in 1996. The number of companies offering service has exploded. With more competition in the marketplace service providers have to reduce their prices to attract customer and keep them from going to competitors. Service providers are desperate to keep margins but even more desperate to keep adding customers. This competetive arena has created a buyers market for DS3 lines and pricing is as favorable as it has ever been!

The soft economy and crash of the stock market has also contributed to the reduction in ds3 price. Since the peak of the market in 1999 many companies have gone out of business and no longer require service. This means there's a smaller pie available and there are plenty of telecom providers trying to get their share. Once again, the buyer is in control and can shop until he or she finds the price that is right for them.

A final reason for the reduction in DS3 pricing is the fact that equipement costs and the cost of supplying the bandwidth have decreased. This means that companies can supply the bandwidth at a lower cost. As bandwidth usage continues to increase as a result of bandwidth hungry applications like video on demand and graphic heavy applications the price of bandwidth will coninue to drop. The only factor that seems tlikely to inhibit prices from falling much further is the "last mile" or the connection from the users premise to the service providers' POP (Point of Presence), but we'll save this issue for another article. Until then, enjoy those affordable DS3's and good luck finding a price that's right for you!