The Internet is full of information about IP-PBX, or VoIP, phone systems. But, although some of this material can be quite useful, much of it is inaccurate or incomplete. As a business considering making the switch to an IP-PBX system, you need to get your hands on salient, and accurate, information before you decide to overhaul your communications infrastructure.
Fortunately, you have come to the perfect place. What follows are some of the most common myths about VoIP and the truth behind these fallacies:
Myth: Cost you a pretty penny
Truth: IP-PBX telephony can actually help you halve your monthly phone bill. With VoIP, connecting remote offices and workers is much more cost-effective than it is with legacy telephony, as best-in-class vendors provide free calling between all employees no matter where they are located. VoIP also helps reduce hardware costs, makes scaling your phone system simpler and less expensive, and cuts out per extension licensing fees.
Myth: Deploying and managing VoIP systems is time-consuming and complex
Truth: In reality, switching to IP-PBX is a breeze. Best-in-breed VoIP telephony is plug-and-play, which means as soon as you plug into your network you are ready to begin using the service. You don’t have to fiddle with phone system settings or ask your busy IT team to help deploy the technology on all of your employees’ smartphones. Mobile clients can be deployed through email, and software updates are automatic. Additionally, a top-shelf software based IP-PBX service lets you manage all aspects of your system from a single computer screen.
Myth: Call quality suffers
Truth: VoIP traffic runs over the Internet, so years ago, before broadband Internet was common, VoIP traffic could run into congestion problems during transmission, which could in turn lead to poor call quality. Now, however, packets travel over a wide range of frequencies, making congestion less frequent and VoIP QoS much more consistent. In fact, if your company has a high-speed Internet connection, you may find VoIP gives you better quality on your calls than you’ve ever had.
Myth: Only for large enterprises
Truth: VoIP offers as many advantages for small businesses as it does for large corporations. On top of saving money for smaller companies constrained by fewer resources, a first-class VoIP solution offers a host of valuable business tools that help drive productivity and make it easier to compete with the giants in any industry. These features include:
- Auto attendant and call queues
- Unified messaging that brings emails, faxes and voicemails to a single inbox location
- The ability to view and manage incoming and queue calls with a mouse click
- Click 2 Call functionality from Outlook, Salesforce and other CRMs, with full logging
We’ve only just begun to tackle the misconceptions plaguing the IP-PBX telephony. But did we miss something? If you still have questions about how the technology works and the benefits it offers, please visit the VoIP FAQ & Info page on our website.