Hosted PBX (Private Branch eXchange) White Paper

ABSTRACT/SUMMARY
Hosted PBX provides several benefits to companies of all sizes. Business can realize both initial and long-term savings with Voice over IP (VoIP), and with Hosted PBX capital investment is minimal.

Hosted PBX is also easier and less expensive to manage and support, which means there is less reliance on IT teams or outside contractors for moves, adds and changes.

Businesses can take advantage of rich calling and collaboration features in their Hosted PBX solution.

INTRODUCTION
Your business has many priorities. With so many things to focus on, you may not be thinking about your phone system – it does the job, so why change it? But what if your phone system was able to help your employees be more reachable? Or it could help make your employees more productive? Or provide a means to respond more quickly to your customers?

If these outcomes are important to you, then switching to Hosted PBX should be on your priority list. Technologies such as Voice over IP (VoIP), especially when provided through a “cloud” based service deliver an impressive array of capabilities, and at a price point that fits all budgets.

A legacy phone system, with its outdated technology is very expensive to maintain, is difficult to scale, and does not deliver modern features that your business needs to succeed.

ARE YOU MOVING OR ADDING A NEW LOCATION?
Switching to Hosted PBX when moving offices or expanding locations will not only save your business time and costs but will give you the opportunity to take advantage of useful features you never had with your old system. Moving an older phone system can present challenges as often it is difficult and expensive to move. In addition, the cost of uninstalling, transport, and reinstall can represent 20-40 percent of the cost of purchasing a new system.’

Adding an additional office location is another reason to consider switching to Hosted PBX. Transferring the entire company to Hosted PBX in this situation will not only be easier to manage but will only nominally increase the time and effort it takes when compared to what it would take to maintain and monitor two separate phone systems (or more, depending on how many office locations you have).

CAN YOUR CURRENT PHONE SYSTEM GROW WITH YOUR BUSINESS?
Most legacy on-premises phone systems have a maximum number of phones they can support before having to purchase additional equipment. With Hosted PBX, simply connect your employees to the Internet and they can take advantage of the benefits of your Hosted PBX solution.

Increased customers can also tax your legacy phone system. If you don’t have enough incoming and outgoing phone lines, customers will get a busy signal, which leads to hang-ups, and potentially ends in lost revenue. A Hosted PBX system can be set up to have a potentially limitless number of lines that are activated when all real phone lines are busy. These lines can play music on hold or have a custom Auto Attendant to direct callers to the right person.

ENHANCE PRODUCTIVITY
If you have an outdated phone system, you are missing out on the productivity enhancing features that are available with Hosted PBX. Below are just a few of these capabilities:

• Call Reporting – Hosted PBX systems offer impressive call reports and stats, as well as the ability to track and monitor individual phone calls – features that are extremely valuable to a business inside sales team.
• Mobility and softphone applications
• CRM integration
• Instant Messaging and Presence

WHAT IS HOSTED PBX?
Hosted PBX makes all the features and capabilities of a best-in-class phone system available to you without the need for a big capital purchase. With Hosted PBX, the service provider hosts and manages the phone system in their network. As a business, you do not have to worry about the expense, maintenance, or other downsides to purchasing a physical phone system. Instead of that big up-front investment, you pay only for what you need.

With Hosted PBX, companies can expect:

• Low or No Capital Costs – Unlike premise-based systems, the “brains” of Hosted PBX reside in the cloud, so there is very little equipment to purchase, resulting in limited up-front costs – and often these are included as part of your monthly bill.
• Predictable Operating Expense – Monthly voice and data charges are usually calculated on a per user basis. If you have 10 employees each with a telephone on their desk, your monthly operating cost will be 10 times a set fee. If you add people, you’ll know exactly how your costs will increase.
• No Maintenance Expenses – When choosing the complimentary phone service, equipment costs and maintenance are provided by FMTC as your service provider. Maintenance costs are additional with other packages.
• Business Continuity – Since the phone system resides in a secure facility with safeguards like back-up power and equipment, events at your location (such as a power outage) would not affect your business. You can simply and quickly configure the service to have the calls routed to an alternate number (such as another location, home, or mobile device).
• No Obsolescence – The service provider hosting the system will routinely upgrade the service so that new software enhancements are delivered as needed.
• Feature-Rich Hosted PBX communications improve call handling, routing, mobility, and collaboration.

BENEFITS OF HOSTED PBX
By investing in a Hosted PBX solution, businesses can reduce expenses, improve employee productivity, increase flexibility, and better serve customers:

• Month-over-Month Cost Savings

• Hosted PBX reduces overall cost-of-ownership because there’s no phone system equipment to buy or lease.
• Most business Hosted PBX packages come with unlimited nationwide calling, resulting in a dramatic savings in long-distance costs.

Less Reliance on IT – Hosted PBX is easier and cheaper to manage and support, in part because Hosted PBX and its features reside in the cloud.

• Hosted PBX eliminates the need to maintain hardware.
• Easy to move and make changes can all be done via simple software changes.
• Users can manage features and call routing themselves via an easy-to-use web interface.

Improve Productivity

• Visual Voicemail – Easily check voice, and video messages from a single message center. Voice messages can even be translated into text so you can read them without dialing in to retrieve them. Listen, delete, or respond at the touch of a button.
• Contact Management
  • Instant Messaging
  • Presence provides availability status of contacts using both calendar and phone status
  • Integrate contacts on any device
  • Search, call and edit any of your contacts effortlessly, keeping them synchronized
  • Send instant messages to others in your corporate directory using the same service, no matter the device they are using
• Mobility
  • Seamlessly move calls from device to device, or from cellular to Wi-Fi, even in the middle of a call.
  • Employees can work from anywhere and use all the features they value so much when you’re in the office, and all connected to their office phone number.
    Quickly change call routing using an easy-to-use web portal.

SUMMARY

FMTC Hosted PBX is truly the last phone system you’ll ever need. It delivers best-in-class capabilities at a price that fits all budgets. As described earlier, a Hosted PBX solution has a lot of advantages. In addition to those listed above, there are additional benefits:

• Cost Savings – You will have a bundled price for everything you need to run your business. Hosted PBX includes everything you need to support the voice and data needs of your business. Included with the price of each “seat”, or user, is:
  • Full feature set plus a web portal to customize the business or employee experience
  • Business-wide features such as Auto Attendant and Music on Hold
  • A large pool of long-distance minutes
  • Equipment and installation
• No Hidden Costs – Simply pay a flat rate per employee per month. As your business expands, simply add new users to your account.
• Big Business Features – Hosted PBX provides you all the features you need and then some. If you’re on an older system today, you’ll be thrilled with the functionality that’s available with Hosted PBX. Included are the features you’d expect like call transfer, voicemail, call forwarding, and more. However, what really makes Hosted PBX exciting are capabilities such as:
• Mobility – FMTC’s mobility package, MaX UC, allows you to integrate your mobile device, tablet, or laptop into Hosted PBX. MaX UC includes downloadable clients for:
  • Windows based laptops/desktop computers
  • Android-based mobile devices and tablets
  • Apple devices and tablets (iPhone, iPad, MacBook)

Max UC integrates your mobile device with enterprise phone functions and enables you to send and receive calls from any connected device. You can also Instant Message, Video Chat, integrate with Microsoft Outlook, and move active calls between devices.

• Communication – Max UC provides fully integrated messaging features for seamless communication.
  • Instant Messaging and Presence, and SMS capability
  • Integrated collaboration capabilities for Desktop and Application Sharing
  • HD Voice

• Quick and Easy Customization – An easy-to-use web portal enables you and your employees to easily customize their phone system experience to suit the way they do business.
• Mobile or Out of Office Employees? – With the click of a mouse, a user can take advantage of Hosted PBX powerful remote office capabilities to have their desk phone and mobile phone ring simultaneously or use the mobile client to receive calls anywhere.
• Want to distribute inbound sales calls to a group of employees? – Again, a click of a mouse in the web portal lets you set up a hunt group that can ring your sales team’s phones simultaneously, in sequence, or in a specific pattern.
• Local Customer Service – FMTC is located where you are. Should there ever be a question or problem, our trained staff will quickly solve it to your satisfaction. Compare that to other providers that serve customers with an 800 number, and you’ll understand why local is better.
• Voice Quality and Security – Since Hosted PBX is a service that’s fully managed, we ensure a superior experience. With Hosted PBX, end-to-end quality and security are assured. All calls are routed via the internet or our managed network to give your calls highest quality.

CONCLUSION
There are a lot of options out there when looking at a phone system. It may seem like the status quo is the safest bet. However, the pace of technology has now made possible an impressive array of capabilities available to small business that was previously only available to larger ones. Now is the time to evaluate your needs and see if new capabilities might help your business be more productive. You will find you can make a big jump forward while spending pretty much what you’re spending today or even saving money.
With Hosted PBX, FMTC is delivering a best-in-class phone system with select packages with no up-front costs that allows you to buy only what you need. We take care of all the details including phones, equipment, installation, training, and ongoing service so you can focus on your business. Best of all, we’re local and available 24/7 with afterhours emergency support to help solve any problems you might have.
Find out how Hosted PBX can help your business.
Call 208-452-2000 or visit fmtc.com/managed-voice-data/