Business Benefits

Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity

Traditional telephone systems or ‘customer premises equipment’ (CPE) including IP based systems are all dependent on the service provider installing lines at the customer’s place of business. Whilst the local exchange handles the routing of calls across the public network (PSTN), the vital inbound numbers are dependent on three things:

• A functioning telephone system
• Power
• A cabled connection to the exchange

Without any one of these, your company will lose a critical lifeline: your customers’ ability to ring you on your main business line. A failing of the current system is that DDI (direct dial inward) number groups, which most organisations have, cannot be re-directed individually by BT, only as a block. This means that in a disaster (e.g. flood) your DDI calls will have to be sent to ONE number - a location that is unlikely to be equipped to deal with a massive increase in call volumes. A complete loss of management, process and inevitably business, will result.

Rosecom Hosted IPT allows users to log into their extension profile and re-route calls on the fly. Alternatively, for large organisations with thousands of DDIs, predetermined routes can be set up to alternative individual numbers for each user - e.g. home, mobile, PC client. Alternatively, all extensions may be programmed to ring a users mobile simultaneously with their desk phone, meaning only one number need be given out and providing instant DR.

Combined with access to business IT systems (which can also be in a secure hosted environment - please call for further details), organisations can continue to function in a ‘virtual’ environment; that is to say, without a fixed premises.

New ways of working

With the flexibility that Rosecom Hosted IP Telephony (IPT) brings, it is possible to re-think the way an organisation provides staff with accommodation and therefore the high costs associated with office space. For example, using true hot desking (where the user’s location only requires an Internet connection for access to both voice and data applications), there is no longer a need for a fixed desk for many workers. When it is necessary to come into the office, they simply find an empty desk, plug their laptop into the phone and log in; it then becomes ‘their’ desk.

This is ideal for organisations that regularly have a proportion of their workforce on the road or visiting other sites and also where homeworking is being adopted.

Mobility/One Number

Along with flexibility, mobile workers need to route telephone calls via a single number to a variety of destinations. Rosecom Hosted IPT can automatically try several numbers until the user is tracked down.

Calls can be set up using any PC connected to the Internet, either with a headset or routed to the nearest landline telephone if no headset is available.

Presence and Instant Messaging (IM)

Presence is the ability to see the availability of a user within customer groups or teams. If they are on the telephone/away/unavailable, this is made visible via a ‘jellybean’ - a red or green indicator - next to the person’s name in a team directory (which can be linked or imported from any corporate database). An instant message may be sent to the individual instead. There are also developments through Nortel’s partnership with Microsoft to link this with their Office Communication Server (OCS) system.

Accommodation

As stated under ‘new ways of working’, the amount of desk space that an organisation needs can be reduced, simply through the use of Rosecom Hosted IPT. True hot desking enables workers to use any desk to log into their telephone extension, whether at home or in the office. The benefit lies in the ability to reduce floor area through a shared desk policy and therefore dramatically reduce overheads.

Office Expansion

A dilemma faced by growing businesses is deciding when is the best time to expand and invest in additional property. This is coupled with location issues and in traditional telephony terms, this also means trying to link offices together. Typical problems are:

• Cannot find anywhere within the same exchange area so that numbers can be similar
• Have to spend a fortune on leased lines to link sites together
• Long lead times for PSTN network services (e.g. ISDN 30/Analogue)
• No adequate voice link at all with the new location
• Disaster Recovery becomes more complex

Rosecom Hosted IPT enables this to be done with ease as every additional desk, whether in a temporary serviced office suite, or a whole new office block will share the same extension range and facilities. Telephones can be set up quickly and efficiently using standard customer settings and handsets.

Financial

The following are strong reasons why finance directors will like Rosecom Hosted IPT:

• Operational rather than capital investment keeps cash flow healthy
• Zero call charges for all Rosecom inter-site and corporate users (even home workers)
• Zero mobile call charges for corporate travellers in a WiFi zone
• Low call charges across the PSTN
• Reduced management resources
• Single supplier for network infrastructure and network services