Smartphones are an essential tool for staying in touch with the office while working from home. They can also be invaluable devices for making sure you never miss an enquiry from a possible client.

The ubiquitous BlackBerry is a solid option and is great for email and keeping connected, while the latest model of the Apple iPhone now allows you to cut and paste from documents onto emails and vice-versa, which could prove useful when working away form your home office.

Smartphones offer great freedom to workers and thousands of people are upgrading their regular phones for a smartphone. Consumers, and particularly business consumers, are increasingly looking for more from their mobile devices and expect functions such as mobile email, web browsing and MMS to come as standard. In fact, sales of regular mobile phones have dropped off, while smartphone sales a booming.

In addition to smartphones, tablets have a growing fanbase. Apple's iPad is probably the most common, but BlackBerry manufacturer RIM, Samsung, HP, LG, HTC and others also manufacturer similar devices. Take a careful look at the specifcations on each before making your final choice.