Advice on a small business phone system?

Good point bigredshark, thanks for the input.

iaind - Could you please expand on what you were saying? Ive just read that "A 2-channel ISDN2e circuit costs about the same as 2 conventional phone lines, but it offers higher quality and far greater potential."

What are the benefits?
 
We use a panasonic KXT308 for 2 incoming phone lines, the unit allows them to go to several extensions (currently 4) so anyone can answer or dial on either of the 2 incoming lines. The system is really easy to use and is configured via a USB connection so can be updated or changed at the click of a button from the computer software console.

We use a 3rd party carrier for calls and despite the phones being in constant use our calls come in at about £10 a month - far less than my home phone.

ADSL, fax and our modem for batch processing C-Cards are on a seperate line.
 
Hi Slime101, thanks for your reply it is very interesting. Thinking about it, i believe we would basically end up with the exact same setup as you with 3 physical phones lines, 2 of them into the 308 for voice and probably PDQ credit card machine, and then a separate line for Broadband / Fax / Alarm.

Can i ask who you rent the lines from and who your carrier is? Would you prefer if i sent you a message in trust?

Cheers

EDIT: Also, just wondering how the music on hold works and what you use for voicemail?
 
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Major_Disaster said:
Good point bigredshark, thanks for the input.

iaind - Could you please expand on what you were saying? Ive just read that "A 2-channel ISDN2e circuit costs about the same as 2 conventional phone lines, but it offers higher quality and far greater potential."

What are the benefits?
Click to expand...

Well they claim the call quality is higher. It's also a single BT cable that needs to be installed rather than 2. Plus you could have numererous numbers associated with the ISDN line, whereas with analogue lines it's one number per line. So with ISDN you could have a single company number which both phones could use or 6 numbers total split between the 2 phones....just much more flexible.
 
Hi Major_Disaster,

I'm not in work today but will find out more tomorrow. AFAIK the lines come from BT, the carrier for calls i will check.

Music on hold comes from a CD player sitting on the window sill via a phono lead, just an old sony discman type thing on repeat. Voicemail comes from the unit itsself, programmed via one of the telephones.
 
We have 2 ISDN2e lines (4 channels) here, and a cheap phone system that I installed. It's worked out *far* cheaper over the years than it would have been to have a rented system or system with a maintenance contract.
 
Thanks for the responses.

Slime101 - Cheers for looking into the providers. Also, i cant find any mention of voicemail on the Panasonic site (here) I see it mentions - "Voice Message (Optional)" did you have to buy an extra addon card? I think we were reccomended a BT Diverse 75, but thats just a bog standard answer machine.

Also, just wondering, im going to need probably two physical lines for the PBX, each with a telephone number, say:
01234 567ABC
01234 567XYZ

What happens when you dial out? Do you select which number you want to call through? Is it randomly assigned / if the other is in use? Is a "default" set in the CCU itself? I mean, what is shown as your caller ID?

Cheers
 
I was rushing a bit earlier; I should expand a bit on what we have.

As I said, we have 2x ISDN lines, with a block of 10 DDI numbers. The system can be set to respond to each of the numbers in different ways. For example the main published number for the company is xxxx00, which is set to have most of the phones ringing, so anyone can answer a call. xxxx05 just rings the phone on my desk.

We even route the fax through the system, so as far as the system is concerned, calls to xxxx08 are just another call that's sent to the extension that has a fax machine on it.

We can change the caller ID that each extension shows to the outside world - ie an extension can show its DDI number - but I've just got everything showing the main number, or some of our stupid people get confused by it.
 
Random question ive just thought of. When you phone larger companies, the phone seems to ring once, or not at all, before you are greeted with the options menu - is this a feature of the PBX?

Also, how do you create those menus?

Cheers
 
Yes, usually a PBX feature. Often called an Auto-Attendant (AA). Exactly how it works will depend on the PBX make/model. For instance on a Siemens it's often part of the voicemail (depending on what voicemail card you have!). On a Siemens you record your messages via the voicemail.

Some people might lump AA and IVRs (Interactive Voice Response) together, but IVRs usually do a lot more (eg phone banking).
 
I'm also looking at installing a voip system in our business (we're I.T. staff) we currently use normal incoming bt lines and voip via linksys for outgoing calls. we're now looking at setting up a new multi line incoming system, can anyone recommend a SIP supplier than is reasonably priced , can support multiple lines ?
 
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