Help Voice Play Nice on the Network

UCaaS is the next step in the voice evolution, but voice is tricky. It is not just another app on the network. When users experience issues they are not as forgiving as when email is "slow." VXSuite analyzes all aspects of cloud communications, marrying the phone call records, video sessions, network traffic, etc. with their effects on the voice, in real-time. 

Let us help you correlate and unify disparate data sets, enabling you to handle issues regardless of where they may occur.

VXPulse offers: 

• Universal reporting for any IP address, regardless of manufacturer 

• Simulated calls across the network to test voice and video success 

• Reports to determine average as well as high and low MOS scores 

• Enable multiple teams to have real-time visibility 

Learn more about how VXSuite can help you understand your environment, optimize the network, and deliver great call-quality to your end-users.

Give us a call or shoot us a email . . . Contact Us

7 Things Your UCaaS Solution Needs

Unified Communications (UC) is here to stay -- as evidenced by a recent report from Frost & Sullivan, where almost two-thirds of companies report that UC is deployed within their organization. But it isn't perfect. Companies continue to struggle to align their IT strategies with their business goals, effectively handle security and privacy concerns, and manage a web of multi-vendor solutions.

Why You Should Consider a Cloud-Based Solution:

Unified Communications and Collaboration (UC&C) tools can help mitigate these challenges and support corporate goals for investment. But many businesses struggle to provide a complete suite of UC tools to all end users, across campuses and home offices, geographies and time zones. Enter UCaaS: Unified Communications as a Service.

Moving communications and collaboration applications to the cloud allows companies to see significant, measurable benefits across a range of areas. But, not all UCaaS solutions are alike.

If you're evaluating potential UCaaS providers, make sure to look for key criteria:

1. Secure, reliable performance. With more than 50 percent of employees routinely working remotely, and with companies competing on a global stage, make sure your cloud-based solution can deliver on its SLAs.

2. Cap-ex savings and cost consistency. If you want to reduce up-front investment and move to an Op-Ex model, make sure your chosen provider offers a subscription model in which prices are consistent.

3. Advanced features. Businesses look to cloud-based UC services to deliver cutting-edge capabilities as soon as managers and end-users want them. Make sure you'll be able to turn on advanced functionality as needed, without incurring unexpected costs or needing a contract renewal.

4. Quick deployment. To stay competitive, you need to move on a dime. Make sure your chosen cloud-based solutions can be up and running in hours; that users will always be on the latest version of the software; and that it is easy to configure for new users and use cases.

5. Scalability and flexibility. Cloud-based UC services let companies add and remove new employees as needed. This supports fluctuations in staffing needs and helps growing companies quickly catch up to larger competitors. Make sure your solution provider can offer the kind of flexibility and scalability your business needs today in any location, and on any network or device.

6. Support for multiple locations and remote workers. Few businesses can afford to have IT staff at all their corporate offices, and none can personally support home-office and traveling workers. Look for a cloud solution that can be deployed and managed from anywhere.

7. End-to-end solution set. A single provider makes management a breeze and ensures consistency across applications and platforms. One of the biggest challenges IT managers face is handling the myriad tools in place at their organizations-some of which are brought in by employees themselves, without input from IT. By deploying a single solution with end-to-end capabilities, companies can give their employees everything they need to get work done-all while streamlining contracts, billing, support and management.

UCaaS delivers numerous benefits to businesses as they fight to stay competitive in an increasingly global, collaborative, and always-on world. Make sure your chosen solution can deliver leading-edge capabilities without the need for up-front investment, is easy to deploy to all employees, offers access to advanced features, helps maintain security and compliance, and delivers 24/7 management and support everywhere you need it.

To find out how your business could profit by deploying a UCaaS solution please give us a shout today.

VOIP Quality Monitoring 101

Proactively monitoring every VoIP call allows the telecom manager to solve customer call service problems with more efficiency and improve high-end service selling capabilities. Using a vendor-neutral third-party voice quality monitoring tool provides insight into where issues are occurring

Voice Quality Culprits 

A quality issue for a given endpoint could be a PC issue, a data network issue, a voice routing issue, a Windows server oriented problem, or an IP phone system configuration issue. Finger-pointing, both internally and among vendors involved, can often happen when it comes to tracking down problems with a Unified Communications (UC) system. 

Often it is difficult to determine the cause when users experience voice issues. Issues could be the result of: 

• Hardware device failure 

• Cable connection problems 

• T1 Circuit issues 

• Voice traffic traveling over the public internet 

• Bandwidth limits exceeded 

• Carrier related errors 

The best way to determine what is causing the issue is to use a vendor-neutral voice quality monitoring tool. The tool can pinpoint where the problems are occurring and can offer steps to remedy the issue.  

If you are business is having voice quality problems with your VoIP please give us a shout and we can help diagnose the problem and fix it.

Need a Vanity Toll Free Number for Your Business?

A toll free number can be handy for your customers especially if it's an easy to remember vanity number.

When I set up Caisson years ago, I wanted a vanity toll free.  I used TollFreeNumbers.com a try and they helped me secure (844)CAISSON for a nominal fee.  

They make toll free number vanity registration a breeze and they are professional to work with.

If your business needs to secure a new Toll Free Number or would like to get a Vanity Toll Free Number I recommend giving TollFreeNumbers.com a try. 

Use discount code CAISSON during the checkout process and get 15% off!

My Speed Test Tools of Choise

My two favorite speedtest tools are; 

www.speedtest.net

https://www.megapath.com/speedtestplus/

If your business needs faster internet connection please give us a shout today @ (206)420-0140.

"Fax Never Busy" feature is dead, R.I.P. What to do now.

For small businesses that rely on faxes, one of my favorite features has always been Fax Never Busy. Unfortunately, as with many legacy features these days, Fax Never Busy is going away.

Business phone and Internet provider, Integra Telecom was one of the last carriers to offer this feature. It just notified me today that Fax Never Busy is no longer available. Part of its move to modernize its platforms.

Fax Never Busy was a function of the old Octel Voicemail platform. A few years ago, Intregra moved from a traditional voicemail platform to a new soft switch voicemail platform. Still, it kept the old platform up and working. Until now. 

Here are two alternatives: 

We can place a Call Forward Busy feature on your POTS line. This will make is so that when the line is busy/being used additional in-bound calls will be forwarded to a virtual fax number that will receive and store the fax as a PDF in the cloud. Email notification is an option on this, so customers can receive faxes as PDFs attached to emails right away. You can receive and print the PDFs you are sent.

The inconvenience of this is that there's a storage capacity limit, so you'll have to go in and clear out old PDFs every so often.

Alternatively, you can get a secondary fax line (and machine).

As with all telecom, these alternatives are customizable. Which of these you go with, if either, depends on your unique business needs.

For example, I am working with a customer right now who does not want his faxes to go to email. He wants them to come off a fax machine. So we are working to determine how many lines (and machines) he needs.

Let me know if you have any questions about what's right for your business. I can give you pricing on a variety of configurations. My direct line is (206) 420-0140.

Definitely Know What's In Your SLA. Here's CenturyLink's.

When ordering Dedicated Internet Access (DIA) from any business phone and Internet provider it's important to familiarize yourself with the Service Level Agreement (SLA) backing the services you're considering.

Here is CenturyLink's Internet Port SLA, for those of you considering CenturyLink.

Specifically, here's what a SLA gives business customers:

• Guaranteed uptime
• Guaranteed speed
• Guaranteed trouble resolution

No SLA from your provider? Then they give what's called a "best effort" agreement. No guarantees. That's why at Caisson, we strongly recommend services that come with SLAs.

If you would like to discuss SLA's or Dedicated Internet Access (DIA), please give me a call direct at (206) 420-0140 or contact us.

About Brian Wade

Brian Wade is founder and president of telecom brokerage, Caisson Technologies. He has worked in telecom for 15 years with experience as a customer care representative, service provisioner and sales representative. He launched Caisson in 2005. He writes about telecom products, promotions and industry trends on his blog.

About Caisson

Caisson Technologies is a northwest-based telecommunications consulting company. We sell the business phone and Internet services of over 40 telecom providers, including CenturyLink. We're the better way to buy because we work with the service providers so you don't have to. We're here longterm, so you always know who to call. And we save you money, typically 20 - 30%. Plus, our consulting is free. Here's how.

We're easy to reach at (206) 420-0140.

Fiber service is likely available at your location already

I was reminded again this week just how available Enterprise Fiber is to businesses in the urban core. It's very available.

This is due in part to cellular service providers, who had to build Fiber to provider 4G service to customers months or years ago. Cellular towers have had to go from T1s to Fiber as their data needs have grown. To do this, they've contracted with telecom providers, like Integra Telecom and tw telecom to get that Fiber built ASAP. Business customers that need fast Internet can tap into this network and get Fiber service to their business locations.

I'm working with a number of organizations on Fiber solutions at the moment, including one where we are splicing into a cellular provider's existing Fiber build. That's what made me think to send this tip to you. 

Want to know if your business's new or existing location qualifies for Fiber service? I can answer that for you. Just give me a ring direct at (206) 420-0140. Or, to learn more about my company visit: Caisson Technologies.