Voice over IP is one of the hottest new technologies available for telecommunications today. Its proper application can improve productivity and reduce the costs of managing your telephone system. But using VoIP requires expertise that is not widely available as of yet. By using experienced application consultants like those available through BCC Telecom, your company can reap the benefits and avoid the potential shortfalls that some companies experience. Remember: the benefits of VoIP require proper design and architecture of your network.
When people talk about Voice over IP, there are really two areas to differentiate. First is the use of VoIP internal to your company: to replace or supplement your phone system, and for inter-office calls. The second area applies to all your calls outside of your company. With that in mind..
What Makes VoIP Phone Systems Different?
When your company uses VoIP for its internal phone system, you have the opportunity to eliminate the costs associated with installing new phone jacks, figuring out what cables go where, and the challenges of adding voicemail boxes and configuring your phone system. VoIP phones simply plug into any Ethernet jack in your office. The phone itself can be moved to any jack on your network without the need to make changes to your phone system configuration. Many companies will pay over $100 for every move or add to their phone system - this cost goes away completely.
How Can VoIP Benefit Inter-Office Calls?
If your company has multiple offices, VoIP can allow you to merge your telecom network to further reduce your costs of maintaining phone systems and managing moves and adds. A company with four offices in one state can now have a single operator or voicemail system to handle all four offices. Inter-office calls can be reduced to a zero cost per minute, while long distance calls can be provided at a lower cost per minute.
What Other Benefits Can My Company Obtain From VoIP?
How would you like to have your voicemail messages appear via email, saving you the time of logging into, navigating the menus and hearing each voicemail? With integrated messaging, you can simply click on the email attachment to hear the message, either from your desk or while on the road. Using your cursor, you can speed forward or go back to listen again. If you want others to hear a voicemail message, simply forward it via email to anyone you want.
If you are traveling but want to receive calls from certain people on your cell phone, VoIP allows you to specify phone numbers from incoming callers that you would like forwarded directly to your cell phone; or if you'd like, all calls can ring to your cell phone.
While traveling on the road, your "road warriors" can install "soft-phones" on their laptops to connect to the office phone system via their wireless internet connections while in hotels, thereby operating as if they are sitting in the office.
These are just some of the benefits that VoIP can provide your company.
Do I Need a New Phone System?
This is where BCC Telecom is different. We are not in business to sell you new phone systems. You can gradually add VoIP functionality to your present phone system, using a variety of external devices to expand your telephone network. Or, perhaps you are ready for a new phone system anyway, in which case a VoIP system may suit your needs. Since we do not sell equipment, we advise our clients how to obtain the most functionality for their equipment budgets. Our goal is to control your cost, not obtain fat commissions from big equipment sales.
Can I use the Internet to Eliminate My Long Distance Bill?
In a word - no. The quality of internet-based VoIP calls today are influenced by the vagaries of the internet. There are certain times of day when the quality of your calls will be reduced due to heavy internet traffic. This typically is not acceptable to large companies with heavy phone usage. By the same token, smaller companies often find this not to be enough of a problem to offset the cost savings that result. They understand what they have and are happy to be on the leading edge of a new technology. In any case, proper architecture of a VoIP system utilizing the internet will ALWAYS have associated plain old phone lines for backup in case there is a problem with the internet connection.
What About Outsourcing My Phone System?
For smaller companies, outsourcing your VoIP phone system might be the right solution. This eliminates the investment in equipment and maintenance, since these services are provided by a VoIP services provider providing Hosted Centrex. Through careful planning and installation of internet circuits with managed Quality of Service, you can have the benefit of most of the features found in a full phone system for a nominal monthly fee per phone number. Unless the location is for just one or two telecommuting employees, BCC Telecom does not recommend the use of Hosted Centrex on low-cost DSL lines since they do not guarantee Quality of Service.
Hosted Centrex provides all the features of the best phone systems. For companies with telecommuters or employees that work from home, this approach will allow everyone to be part of the corporate phone network through the use of their DSL or Cable Modem line. Home workers can be part of your customer service department, accounting, or any other department and they will appear, from a phone perspective, to be in the office while working at home.
How Are VoIP Calls Connected Through the Internet?
If your company routes calls through the internet, instead of using your local phone company to connect a call, your call is routed to the local VoIP phone service provider. Your call is then connected to the public telephone network exactly like any other regular phone call. So your use of the internet is only to connect from your office to the service provider, who may be less than 150 miles away. The service provider has T1 phone lines that connect your calls at a very low cost per minute, often half the cost of what you may pay today. The fact that the service provider is so close reduces the risk of packet loss, latency and jitter that can affect voice quality.
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