Benefits of VOIP 3

[DomP]

If you had to summarize the benefits and pitfalls of VOIP what would they be? And is VOIP much more attractive/compelling to organizations that have multiple sites compared to an organization that only has one site.

Your insights would be much appreciated.

Thanks,

Dom

 

[orypecos]

The main advantage of station voip is that if your system is totally voip, then u don't have to do all the wiring for the telephones. U plug them into your LAN. Course that is assuming u have a LAN. But the LAN has to be managed properly or your phones are going to have problems. If u are installing a new pbx in a building without wiring, half of the cost of the pbx can be wiring costs.
As far as viop trunk, u can save money by using trunks for voice with prioriy, then data secondary to save u money. Interaction between voip trunks and voip stations can cause problem sometimes though.
Many vendors are still working out their problems with voip so if u want a near guarentee of very little problems, go with non voip.

 

[ccmuser]

another big factor is total cost of ownership.. Pbx are traditionally being managed by a team with a differnt skill set then you IT/network people. VOIP allows to cross leverage people a little easier(not always the case but a general assumption). The maintance costs of a VOIP system are also leverage across multiple budgets usually. You are going to have maint contracts on your phones and switched regardless of the solution.. Maint on a ccm or other voip box is so much less costly then a tradional PBX.

Then you have the leveraging of your actuall data lines. WIth the price of Frame and ATM today. it is cost effective augment your data service to carry voice. Large Some companies can save 100's of thousands due to this fact and toll bypass combined.

 

[lopes1211]

I personally have never seen any of these pie in the sky savings from VOIP. I certainly cannot see any company saving "hundred of thousands of dollars" by consolidating their intra company traffic with current LD rates around $.025/m. Nothing is for free. The only real benefits I have seen first hand are specific examples of remote locations with a handfull of phones no longer needing their own voice server since they can just slave off of the voice server at the corporate HQ. There are also some specific examples where large remote offices with their own voice servers can leverage voicemail or acd servers/services at an HQ location. Remote sales force via IP softphones have worked well also. The benefits are in functionality, conformity, and ease of deployment. Transmission method (IP vs TDM) does not magically make voice calls or voice service free. You will benefit if you have a need to utilize the technology for a specific application not if you just do it just to do it.

-CL

 

[bkrike]

Well said Lopes...I agree

 

[IPGuru]

Lopes has hit the nail on the head!

if you require phone in your main building conventional PBX phones are a beter option that IP Phones.

Cabling Costs? if you have a modern building with cat 5/6 for Network infrastructure this is used wwith the phones anyway.

Where it is usefull is for small branch sites (seperate wherehouse with few phones but lots of data!) or remote workers.

IP phones can also be usefull if you have a shortage of sockets in a crouded office (1 port for phone & pc instead of 2 )

for networking 2 sites you can either put voice accross a data link, or put data across a voice link both soulutions are a compromise & it is a matter odf assesing which is best on a case by case basis.

if lots of data , but litte voice between sites go VOiP
if lots of calls & little shared data go for a voice link & data mux's

Summery:- use the technology that suits the operation, do not make the operation fit the technology.

 

[ccmuser]

lopes1211, Do your PBX people currently manage your data natwork? Is avaya/nortel giving you discount on your G3 maint cost that the rest or the world is not seeing.
When retail stores with thousans of locations change to VOIP you don't think they see a cost saving of 100 dollars per year per site?
Esp with centralized 800 number access? Wake up smell the roses!!!

 

[lopes1211]

ccmuser may read too many journals and not actually work on voip in the real world. Do our callcenter designers program routers? no. Do our network engineers install desktop software? no. Do our desktop support staff setup branch offices? no.

I'm not sure what you're getting at. Yes, we do have 1 group manage connectivity to vendors for TDM, IP, T-1, isdn, frame, and atm. Method of transport alone does not eliminate jobs and create magical savings PERIOD. The name on the voice server does not dictate who will manage the applications running on it nor change the skillset required to design and implement telecommunications solutions for the enduser.

Take a new 200 seat call center implementation for example. If you gave a non-telecom related data engineer an Avaya server and the manuals, could they get dialtone to a phone? I would say 70% probably. If you gave that same person a Cisco call manager and the book? I would say 80% probably? Does dialtone mean you have just implemented a sucessful call center? HELL NO!!!

I'm all for saving a buck and if I see an application which can benefit from VOIP I will and do jump right on it. 95% of the time it is not cheaper and the decision has nothing to do money, it's the functionality. If a company is in a position to purchase a new system, should it be VOIP capable? absolutely, so you can take advantage of applications which can benefit your companies specific needs. My only point is that VOIP is not a magical fix that makes everything suddenly free.

As far as maintenance - I've seen maintenance costs on a P3 server pretty typical no matter who's name is on the box. Can you then purchase maintenance for traditional PBX cards and phones? sure. Can you purchase maintenenance for every closet ethernet switch and IP phone? sure. Is maintenenace on a $300 IP phone free but rediculously expensive on a $300 TDM phone?

VOIP has different benefits for different customers and companies. It simply depends on the specific needs of each company and current voice/data topography to determine what flavors of VOIP should be implemented if any at all. I don't beleive in any blanket statement saying some un-named "retail stores saved some money so you better do VOIP". I don't need to wake up, I've been implementing VOIP for 4 years now and know what it can and cannot do. No different than people 6 years ago saying to "sell all of your frame relay equipment now because the world will be all ATM within 2 years". Those that benefit from a technology use it. Those who wont should not no matter who tells them they're missing out and need to wake up.

-CL

 

[donporter]

I am with lopes1211.
The benifits today are not there.
Most vendors (cisco) don't want to troubleshoot phones and PCs on the same wire.
If you don't have the Network Infrastructure then don't expect to be running 100% without problems.
The technology is 5 years old...Not 30/40/50 years.

Just because they have change the World of Telephony with ads and paid for written reviews. Doesn't mean they have it all figured out. Cisco is just willing to state there business on the product for its future rewards.

I have 10 3Com system and 10 IP phones on the Inter-Tel product line. None of them work one hundred percent.

 

[ccmuser]

First,
I never made a blanket statement saying everyone needs to switch to voip. I believe the only blanket statement in the whole thread is this one
“I personally have never seen any of these pie in the sky savings from VOIP”

I love how you assume my experience because I do not share opinions. What is the biggest voip/traditional phone network you have managed? You through 200 seats around like it is impressive. I guess we do live in different worlds. I guess part of the problem is your implementations may not be LARGE enough to reap these benefits!!!!
YES WE DO ELIMINATE JOBS WITH A VOIP SYSTEM. DUE MOSTLY TO SIMPLIFY adds moves and changes. And a heck of a lot less paperwork and accounting from circuit consolidation. That has freed our employees to do other work. That is a cost savings!!!! But I guess with one 200 seat call center you may not realize that.

As far as maint goes I can not follow at all what you are saying. Are you telling me that a traditional PBX:ie avaya/Nortel has the same maint cost as an IBM server? I suggest you review your bills a little better!!! One year Main on a G3 will purchase you an IBM server CCM licenses a few years hardware maint!!!! NOW here is where we see your inexperience come through (or maybe just dealing with large sums of other people money and not risking any of yours) you mention adding maint to every closet switch….. Why would you do that? Cisco switches have a TEN year replacement warranty!!!!!! Buy a few spares and let them ship to you in a week!! Not my fault YOU DO NOT KNOW VENDORS policy!!! Ask your local sales team I am sure they are willing to help you. If you do not know who they are let me know were you are from and I will look them up for you... Always willing to help.

Just to make sure you do not misquote me AGAIN. I am not saying all tradition PBX sites MUST change to VOIP, nor will all realize a cost savings. What I am saying is that for a large number of sites there are impressive cost saving attached with the total voip solution.

 

[ccmuser]

I have 10 3Com system and 10 IP phones on the Inter-Tel product line. None of them work one hundred percent.

do you need a consultant?

 

[lopes1211]

It's just reconfirming what I said. There are some specific applications which can realize a ROI or benefit. As far as maintenance goes - yes I am saying the support for the servers are competative. There are some telecom shops that pay maintenance on only only the server and keep some station cards and phones around for swapping out defective equipment just as it sounds your group does on the data equipment. If your equipment goes bad, it's your company's techs that monitor, troubleshoot, swap out, and manage the replacement process. There are some telecom dept's that pay $10K/m to cover every card, phone, etc to have a vendor tech on-site to replace any failure. It's these groups that have a false feeling that they shouldn't provide their own maintenance on the non-server components. I'm trying to say that if you paid a vendor to provide on-site support for all voice gear end to end, it would not be any cheaper if the server, card/blade/switch, and phones carried the name cisco, avaya, 3com, or nortel. This is a VOIP discussion not vendor bashing or direct comparisons between any specific vendor, policies, or pricing, nor a discussion about management of 7500 users over 146 nodes vs whatever goliath company you are managing. Just keep it on topic with examples. Glad it works for you but I havent seen any company eliminate support jobs because a phone is plugged into an ethernet port vs a digital port.

-CL

 

[ccmuser]

But lopes what I am saying is that support is cheaper on a voip solution!!!!!

 

[Duaneness]

I, too, am with Lopes on this one. A simple analogy: when was the last time you picked up a non-IP phone and couldn't make a call? And when was the last time you couldn't hit see a server on your network, or get on the internet because something failed? I constantly recommend AGAINST changing to VoIP for just that reason - reliability. Maybe after the data guys have kept everything up and running on our network for a few years with no failures - I might change my tune. Maybe.

- Duaneness

 

[orypecos]

Of course everything has problems sooner or later, but if u search the Avaya forums u will find many people having problems with voip. Some of that is cuz the customer is unfamiliar with voip, but some is fixed by patches and upgrades that tell me that Avaya for one has not got voip figured out yet. I am not familiar with other voip vendors, so I don' t know if they are having better luck with VOIP.
I for one would not jump with both feet into voip, I would more likely stick my big toe in while they get the kinks out of it.

 

[ccmuser]

Well built data networks go down to to hardware failure!!!!
So do PBX's

If you data guys can't consitstantly keep you your network for a year barring major hardware failure....YOU SHOULD FIRE THEM!!!

 

[ccmuser]

I have never seen so many people against something in a benifits forum...
HMMM let me guess are you guys avaya or nortel or siemans partners?

 

[ccmuser]

Just So everyone knows were I stand.. I do own a consulting company that is a Cisco silver parner(looks like Gold this year if we are last CCIE) and IPT specialzed. I think maybe some background will be interesting to this conversation.
And at certain levels I agree with everyones comments here.. I just want to get and Idea of everyones background here if you don't mind...

 

[DomP]

Since I raised the initial question I'll provide more of the organizational background. I'm the VP of operations for an eighty person company that will probably grow to 100/110 over the next couple of years. We currently only have 1 office (which may or may not change). There is the possibility of staff working from home but currently that is not happening to any great degree. We will be moving our location so all wiring will be new.

The remote capability while nice wasn't really enough to move to voip. I'm also not sure how the voip solution effects phone charges. If we're paying $2,000 - $3,000 per month now what impact does voip have? Does a voip capable system with digital phones provide the same benefit regarding call charges? Since we don’t have multiple sites the connectivity benefit of voip doesn’t really surface either.

My initial thought process was to purchase a voip "capable" system but stay in the digital realm. Then we could/would migrate to voip if and when necessary. What I've come to realize is that the initial outlay for supporting equipment, phones, digital cards, etc.... would have to be revisited if we then decided to move to voip. Not the most cost effective way to get to voip. This has forced me to consider the voip solution from the outset.

Also, from the infrastructure side of things - it's my understanding that the only "data" element associated with the voip solution to be concerned about are the switches. At least layer 2, and I think gig. The server going down doesn't have an impact as the switch is routing voice traffic so as long as the switch is operational calls wouldn't be impacted??? Another benefit of voip was the cabling. One cable run for each work station with the pc connecting to a data jack on the phone. Sounded good, but if this jack is 100meg and my data switches and pc nics are gig I'm not willing to sacrifice the data speed for the cabling dollars. That means voice and data runs anyway. If that's the case would you use the same switches or provide switches for voice and data separately. Obviously separating is more costly and I don't really know if organizations do this and/or if it makes sense. Also, what cable are people using for voip if it’s not separate? 3, 5, etc…..

Sorry for the ramble. To summarize, since we are getting a new phone system it will be at the least voip capable. Aside from that, it’s hard to say. If it is voip, the question regarding the best install from an infrastructure standpoint raises its head.

Thanks for all your assistance.

Dom

 

[ccmuser]

Dom...
What type of Office is this in? Do your users really notice a 1 gig versus 100mb uplink from PC? Depending on the apps being used I see that being an issue but what we do is just run a second drop in those special instances. The cost is more than in just the cost of the cable when you use one line.. The cost of a manages switch port is still hovering around 100 and up.. In you install your are looking at approx 15-20,000 dollar cost saving from running over single cable in a greenfield install. It's enough money to consider how much do my users really need 1 Gig connections.

NEVER bother running Cat 3 anymore.. The cost of your cable plant is labor not the cost of cable!! Don't consider anything less than cat5e for an install of your size.