Business Telephone System

When to Upgrade Your Business Telephone System
By Ralph Willett

Your telephone is your lifeline. It’s how you communicate with your customers or clients. Without it your business couldn’t continue. It rests on your desk and has worked flawlessly for years. It never gives you any problems. You may not even remember the last time you had to have it serviced. You depended on it. Are these statements true with you and your business?

Consider this: If your system hasn’t kept pace with the latest software, your business lifeline is at risk. The flawlessly working telephone system you count on will fail and you could be left with no communications into or out of your business.

Everything will eventually wear out. Entropy is the natural state of all things including your telephone system. When it does, will your service provider be able to repair it? Will replacement parts be available? Will your service provider be able to obtain manufacturer support for the system? These are questions that all businesses have to ask themselves and the service provider maintaining their system.

Examples of Potential Disasters

Company A has been using telephone system from a major manufacturer for 8 years. Except for some minor moves and changes the system hasn’t had to have any service for almost 2 years. Then one Monday morning, everyone arrives at their desk to find they have no dial tone. A frantic call goes out to the service provider and a technician shows up at your door within the hour. The technician believes he has found the failed component and replaces it. But the system still doesn’t return to service. He places a call to the manufacture for tech support but is told that level of software is no longer supported and he can’t be helped. Now your technician is just guessing as to what to do ore replace next. Meanwhile, more time passes as the business looses money.