Personal Use on BES phone

[bptahiti]

I have recently received a company-issued Blackberry that is on the company BES. I know that my company allows some personal use of the phone, but I have a few things I'd like to know before I decide just how much I will use it for personal things, and whether I will drop my personal cell, and use this is my only phone. I don't want my personal use of the phone to get me in trouble. As far as I know, my company doesn't have any established policies for this. I'd ask them first, but I don't want it to seem like I'm going to go nuts with the thing.

1. Texts

I don't really text much, but want to know how they are handled. Do all BES linked plans include texts? Or is there a possibility my plan is a pay-per-text type? Are texts routed through the company server? If so, are they readable by the company admin?

2. Internet Traffic

From what I have read, if using the Blackberry browser, the internet traffic is routed through the company server, thus putting some small load on the company bandwidth. Does using the "internet" browser instead of the BB browser avoid routing through the company server (some sources I've read seem to indicate this).

3. Apps using Internet

When using internet-connected apps, particularly streaming apps like Pandora, does that put extra load on the company network? If so, is it anything significant? I'm assuming if used outside business hours it shouldn't make a difference?

4. Personal Email

Are personal email accounts I set up on the phone (and the emails I send with them) able to be seen by the company admin?

5. Buying Apps

Do any of you allow employees to pay for apps if they agree to pay for them? Not really planning on doing this, but just curious.

[jlsparks]

1. Depends.
2. Yes.
3. No and correct.
4. Depends.
5. I do.

Bottom line: it largely depends upon your company's server configuration, the level of attention paid to BES activity (ie: is there a BES admin whose sole job is to monitor BES activity, or did BES management just get dropped in ITs lap, where it's treated like other stable servers... if it ain't broke...), and, most importantly, your company's policies. If your business is large enough to be running a BES there's a very high probability that it does indeed have policies regarding personal use of company phones. I do. Conversely, if they do indeed have written policies regarding personal use of company phones I'm surprised they dished you a device without having you sign off on the policies. That's poor HR management. In any event, I'd just ask HR casually about it. No harm done, and a lot better than getting slapped around down the road.

[TekWarren]

I've been using google voice for a little while and continue to learn about all the features. Being in the middle of a lot of reading as of late you may consider using GV on your BB to help separate personal and business communications. For example you may want to give out a GV number to personal contacts and have it forward to your BB. Depending on the settings you choose you can have all personal calls appear to be coming from one single GV number. The down side I think is that you won't know who is calling other than it may be personal. You can also SMS text with GV but I haven't played with that to much to know how it differs or those messages would appear to a BES admin.

jlsparks hits the bottom line. You know your company better than anyone here will and if you really need to know...ask. I work in IT but am not personally in charge of our BES administration. I can say that we do not lock devices down, and its definitely not anyone's job to sit and watch BES traffic all day. Every situation/company/organization will be different.

[CanuckBB]

Phone logs, texts and PIN messages can all be logged on the BES.

If you use the BB browser, you are going through your company's firewall and thus subject to the same restrictions as any computer o the network.

Most BES admins don't review logs, we have better things to do, but be aware that if HR requests it, we can dump all that info.

Rule to live by: if you would not say/send it to your boss or HR, don't do it on a BES connected phone.