Hosted PBX - Is It Right For Your Company?

Article Title: Hosted PBX - Is It Right For Your Company?

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Article Description: Today there is a better alternative available to the traditional PBX phone. This alternative is hosted PBX systems. PBX stands for Private Branch eXchange. With traditional PBX, an incoming call can be routed through switchboard hardware to different extensions throughout the company. This hardware is usually kept somewhere on company premises.

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755 Words; formatted to 65 Characters per Line Distribution Date and Time: 2009-08-28 08:36:00

Written By: Nermine Shaker Copyright: 2009 Contact Email: nermine.shaker@thephantomwriters.com

For more free-reprint articles by Nermine Shaker, please visit: www.thePhantomWriters.com/recent/author/nermine-shaker.html

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Hosted PBX - Is It Right For Your Company? Copyright (c) 2009 Nermine Shaker The Sygnal Group www.SygnalGroup.com

Today there is a better alternative available to the traditional PBX phone. This alternative is hosted PBX systems. PBX stands for Private Branch eXchange. With traditional PBX, an incoming call can be routed through switchboard hardware to different extensions throughout the company. This hardware is usually kept somewhere on company premises.

When a call is placed to a company with a hosted PBX service, it goes to the carrier's central office, gets processed through the hardware at their site and then it's sent to your phone extensions. So, Hosted PBX is an IP-based PBX (Internet Protocol) service that is hosted by someone else and provides call routing for your company.

This means that hosted PBX customers don't buy, install or maintain any PBX equipment at their site. This can save a lot of time and money. Companies want to concentrate on their business and not on their telephone and email systems. And the expense for upgrading and maintaining these systems are huge and come with many IT challenges. Many small to mid-size companies can't spend the money for a call center, so a hosted PBX system might be the right choice for them.

Hosted PBX offers rich features, excellent quality and wide coverage. These features are more advanced than traditional PBX and they are easy to manage. This is because the hosted PBX services provide users with excellent web management. Most of the services provide a platform that makes it easy for users to create new accounts, make extensions and manage call queues with the web interface.

Other benefits of hosted PBX include managing incoming calls such as voicemail, faxes, automated messages, conferences, touchtone menus, call records and those phone calls that need to go to the next available person in a department.

It is relatively easy to manage voice mail with a hosted PBX system. With this service you can also utilize your current voice mail facility. If a call comes on your mobile phone and you don't answer it, it will automatically roll onto voice mail. Generally, hosted PBX services have better control over simple call transfers and they can also manage a higher number of phone calls.

The various ways to handle calls include forwarding them to voice mail, granting permissions from the attending person on the other end and automated voice mail recording. With busy lines and unanswered calls, voice mail can be easily setup and it performs well.

Besides all the great call routing functions, other great advantages attached to the hosted PBX systems are lower entry costs, support costs, reliability, improved scalability and flexibility. Hosted PBX also allows greater ease of management and it is better when you need flexibility with your telephony. Let's look at some of these advantages.

Lower Entry Costs

Since you are using the host's infrastructure, your start-up costs for a hosted PBX service will be lower than if you purchased your own phone system.

Lower Supporting Costs

You can manage some support yourself, like adding users or lines by either going online or making a phone call. For some of these operations, you don't have to wait for the phone guy to show up.

Reliability

With hosted PBX, there is usually round-the-clock support. Also, for disaster recovery, there is full data access and redundancy.

Improved Scalability

You can get the exact number of lines that you need for your company. It's easy to add and remove lines as your company grows or contracts.

Flexibility and Productivity

Hosted PBX system has an advantage over the traditional PBX systems in many ways. It provides features that traditional PBX doesn't have and there is more flexibility with it.

Routing calls to phones actually allow you to ring on any phone by calling the extension. Such calls can be made on the mobile phones of your employees who are traveling and cannot access their company phone. This keeps all the traveling employees in constant touch with the office and they can transfer calls as usual. If you have employees who travel a lot, then hosted PBX might be the best system for you.

The biggest considerations in company expenses are capital expenses and operating expenses. Employing a hosted PBX service eliminates most of the capital expenses and reduces operating expenses. Keeping your communication capabilities up to date without hampering your ability to focus on your business is vital. Hosted PBX will provide all of the technology, features and benefits found in expensive PBX systems at a much lower cost and might be a viable option for your business.

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Nermine Shaker is a Partner at THE SYGNAL GROUP, a telecom consulting firm that offers telecom expense management, telecom auditing and VoIP management to businesses of all sizes. Find out how to lower your telecom expenses at www.SygnalGroup.com/ or visit our blog at www.TelecomExpertise.com/