Looking for sources of unbiased information

[PaulChernoff]

Perhaps unbiased isn't the best phrase. I am looking for a new phone system for my office (80-100 users, single location). I've been looking for 5 years and this is the year to pull the trigger. Staff have helped me evaluate handsets for doing basic tasks. We have made some basic decisions but am looking for information to help evaluate between the options. We have a Avaya Definity 75 v3 (last had software upgrade around 20 years ago) which is ill suited for our office. We do not use Microsoft Exchange for e-mail and are an almost all Mac shop. I'm not a phone guy, I'm the IT guy and was handed the phone system around 5 years ago. I have learned my way around phone punch blocks and basic PBX functions.

Hosted vs. Premise. I am leaning towards premise, hosted seems very expensive for us but I am still looking for others' experiences with a few hosted vendors (iCore, PingTone, HotBed Tech).

We are going VoIP. We had our oldest cables tested 2 years ago and they did well under heavy traffic. We are planning on 1Gb phones so I will not have to add extra wiring. We will need to replace our switches and firewall but I want to do this anyway and for various reasons this will only happen if it is made part of the phone purchase. I am evaluating an Avaya system with digital phones if I needed to keep costs very low but right now I should be able to do VoIP within my budget.

For premise based solutions we have narrowed it down to Avaya, Cisco, and Kerio Operator (branded version of Asterix). Each has their plus' and minus'. Each system should serve us well and each has its plus' and minus'.

How do I know if a dealer is top notch? For Avaya I would prefer to stick with our current support company but another company has come in much lower. In looking at all of the bids this one company is a good $20,000 lower than everyone else for hardware/software/installation. What is a good way to find out the quality of the company.

What is the life expectancy of these PBXs? I am not expecting to get 20 years out of it (and I think we are pushing it with our current PBX). But certainly more than 5 years. I can see replacing the PBX in around 7 years but I don't want to have to rebuy licenses or phones. Or do I treat a phone system like a computer system and assume a shorter life span than in the past? I am trying to build 10 year cost projections. We will be using Tenant Improvement funds for the purchase so we will be paying cash, no lease (I realize this makes us an oddity).

I am finding Cisco a bit more expensive to buy than Avaya (Cisco dealer is reworking the proposal to lower costs) but the maintenance costs seem a lot higher. My accounting folks want me to keep operating costs below current costs. With the Avaya systems this isn't an issue.

One advantage of Cisco is that they make their own Phones, switches and firewalls. I am thinking that this may result in a better system by having an integrated ecosystem, but perhaps not. Most Avaya dealers are offering non-Avaya switches and then have me buy contracts from the manufacturer. I want to be sure that if we have a phone problem I have just one number to call, no matter the cause of the problem. I am only considering vendors with lots of data network experience.

So I still feel like a phone newbie and looking for any guidance to make a decision in the next few weeks.

 

[curlycord]

Since your want to lean to premise we wont talk about hosted, enough wars and posts on that already.

I would suggest IP Office from Avaya since your familiar with the features etc.

Look at the Better Business Bureau but remember sometimes you can negotiate pricing but there is a small chance the low baller has not enough experience which results in poor communications, missed cut over times, poor training etc.
Ask them for references too!.

Depending on the phone model (size/features) can impact the pricing too.












=----(((((((((()----=
curlycord

http://www.curlycord.com

 

[PaulChernoff]

The phone models are the same. We did testing beforehand and requested specific handsets. I have a spreadsheet that compares every proposal in detail.

I will call references but people give only good ones. In the case of one vender I happened to come across unhappy clients.

 

[curlycord]

What set type model is the majority?


=----(((((((((()----=
curlycord

http://www.curlycord.com

 

[hairlessupportmonkey]

I think the IP Office in this case will be the go

[ul]
[li]Possible discount for trading up your Definity (check with you reseller)[/li]
[li]Familiarity of phones, features etc.[/li]
[li]Licences are movable to new platforms in years to come.[/li]
[li]More kit is now Avaya branded including excellent network switches (from Nortel's camp)[/li]
[li]Since you are a MAC house, then One-X portal might be a useful form of CTI as its web based.[/li]
[/ul]

However the key is, what's important to you? You will want to draw up a short list, and get resellers in to demo them all for you.

Im totally biased towards IP Office however, but these are some of the pluses for the IP Office. I cant say I see many Cisco installers here plugging their stuff. I just wouldn't go down that route.

ACSS - SME
General Geek

 

[IPGuru]

I am also Highly biased towards IPO but more information would be useful

you state your current system is unsuited to your needs, what exactly are these needs & in which way is the current system unsuitable.

I would also ask why you are wanting to go VoIP, is there a sound reason or is it because of the belief that it is the "Next Big thing"?
both Voip & traditional TDM have there places & it should always be a case of choosing the best tool for the job.

A Maintenance contract is essential, not a Luxury.
Do things on the cheap & it will cost you dear

 

[PaulChernoff]

Thanks for the replies and input. I will answer your questions.

Why is our current Definity a bad match? The Definity 75 is suitable for a much larger organization, it has been overkill for us. We have it because we were owned by a larger company and they took responsibility for our phone system (I was not here at that time). They bought this for themselves and simply bought one for us at the same time. There might have been plans for connecting the phone systems but it never happened (the larger company did connect HQ with satellite offices but we were pretty much a separate entity and have been independent of them for at least 5 years). The Definity has many, many features that we never use. Discoverability is poor so most people do not know how to do anything beyond answer calls, make calls, transfers and check voicemail. We need a much easier to use phone system, then people might take advantage of extra features. I can make other complaints but these reflect the state of the art in 1993 and are fixed by any new system. The only feature that everyone is requesting is caller ID.

Why VoIP? Any time we do construction work or want to add a 2nd person to an office we are hampered by needing new phone wiring. We are better covered by Cat5/5e/6 cabling that Cat 3. By getting 1Gb phones I can easily add a phone to every location either using the network port the computer is plugged in or by plugging the phone into an unused data port. A side issue is that I hate our current switches and VoIP would force us to replace them. Otherwise they don't get replaced. 5 years ago I didn't like the idea of VoIP but it seems to now be reliable. Another bonus with VoIP is that I get to move the PBX into my air conditioned server room, with traditional wiring the PBX will stay in the unairconditioned phone closet, though I believe a new PBX would put off less heat than the current one.

For Avaya I am looking at the 9611G. Everyone gets the same phone, no saving pennies in exchange for higher training and inventory costs. Currently we have a mix of Avaya's first generation digital and analog phones. My life would be easier if everyone had the same exact phone.

Overall, what do we need? Quality phone calls.

We are a single location and mobile workers have no interest in having an office phone at home or making office calls via their smart phone. Visual voicemail is important to be on both phones and a web portal (be it One-X or Cisco's Jabber client). Visual voicemail on smartphones would be nice but we are not going to spend any extra money to get it. No calling centers, just hunt groups. Easy to use and discoverable features are important, otherwise the features will never get used. Integration with users address books, this can be done other by connecting to the Mac Address Book or, better yet, accessing the Address Books on our Kerio Connect mail server (local address books sync with Kerio Connect via CalDAV but these contacts should be available to a phone system via LDAP). Integration with our Open Directory server would be nice to make administration easier. We do not have Active Directory or Microsoft Exchange so any system that depends on them for various features have been eliminated from consideration. Click to Dial would be nice, especially Click to Dial from DayLite CRM. Currently Avaya is limited in this regard, Click-to-Dial on a Mac can only be done via X-One which doesn't meet the needs of our salespeople, but we know of a company working on this issue. We know of 3rd party products which will work with Cisco phones.

The Avaya 9611g seem somewhat simpler to use than the Cisco 89xx series but the speaker phone didn't test out as well (picked up too much noise but the latest firmware seems to have fixed this problem). Staff who tested the phones (we had a shoot out with test phones from various companies in our conference room) liked both the Avaya and Cisco phones. Everyone liked all of the phone much better than what is currently on their desks (except for Mitel, some people had a very strong negative reaction to them, which surprised me).

Just got a call from a phone salesman. Got to go.

 

[GordonKapesMZ4]

I keep pushing the UCx platform from E-metrotel.....but it sounds like you want to use the Avaya 96xx IP sets if I am correct?

Joseph Sus-Nortel Installer/Programmer

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/joe-sus/12/1a7/856

 

[PaulChernoff]

At this point I am leaning towards the Cisco solution. Though I this point string a tin cans might be an improvement. I think all of the solutions I have looked at are good and would make my co-workers happier. I also have faith that the installers of the different systems are all very good. The Cisco and Avaya systems are very similar in price.

The big considerations include: is VoIP worth the extra money over TDM (this is a $20,000 difference). If I had to buy the switches and firewall separately, which I need for our data network, I would spend around $15,000, and the VoIP will give me more flexibility.

The considerations between Avaya and Cisco have to do with our particular office and not the worthyness of each system, I like both of them. When I reached out to people in similar situations I found some very happy Cisco users and some not so happy Avaya users. So I find it interesting that so many people here like Avaya. Perhaps it is a difference between people with phone backgrounds and data backgrounds.

The Kerio Operator system looks good but it is missing many of the features of the big boys, such as scheduled forwarding and directory showing up on the phone. We have to decide if these extra features are worth $40,000.

I do have a question concerning our Avaya bids. I have bids from 2 national companies. One company seems on target, their bid is reasonably lower than the smaller Avaya dealers who sent in proposals. If I went Avaya they would use a very, very good company to do the actual installation. Yet another very large Avaya dealer also put in a bid that is $20,000 for a very similar proposal. This price difference is enough for me to consider Avaya over Cisco. But alarm bells go off in my head. Perhaps this company doesn't really want to sell me an IP Office and if their proposal wins will try to upsell me on Avaya Enterprise. Or perhaps their installation fee doesn't cover all of the work and I will get hit later with extra labor charges. I have never bought a phone system before so perhaps someone could point me to what to look for. Unfortunately this low cost proposal listed everything at list price and then put in a large discount so I can't see how they are lowering costs (e.g. special Avaya promotions).

 

[phoneguy610]

for the 100 ip phones alone it should cost you around $25-30k

This is not including the IPO, switches, licensing, and labor for installation.

So if someone is bidding 20k for everything, i would definitely be worried.


ddcommllc.com
Avaya/Toshiba/Nortel

ACIS

 

[PaulChernoff]

I guess I misstated it. One company bid $20,000 less than the other company for very similar proposals. Oh no, no one bid $20,000, that would have to involved stolen equipment and forced labor. These are both large Avaya resellers. But there might be stuff in the installation parts of the proposals that might be important and I am looking for guidance on key things to look for.

 

[Westi]

get a scope of work from both and compare and have the more expensive company maybe take a look at the proposal and explain why they are so much more money. They might point out something very fundamental that is a big cost factor.

make sure there is all included that you need like
- site survey (not over the phone or via pictures)
- design meeting to find out what you need and want (will be partially already be determined by the sales process otherwise you are missing parts or licenses)
- training for all staff
- set placement
- cutover
- after cut support of a few hours on site not remote

this is a rough draft of what will be in the scope of work as it should be more detailed and include stuff like unpacking the phones and taking the garbage back. Maybe also disposal of the old phone system as that might cost you a good dime to do if you get stuck with it.

sometimes a cheaper solution is not worse but just the attempt of a company to get your business even if they make no money on the sales or even have to shed money out to get the deal.
Sometimes it is the nasty operation of a company to get your business and then kill you with service charges. Make sure you get full admin rights (for IP Office that means security access) to the system and not just a user access when you get the system and don't pay until you have it.

Joe W.

FHandw, ACSS

http://convergednetworks.ca

 

[PaulChernoff]

Joe, that is excellent advice. I have been referred to an Avaya representative to help me sort this out. My biggest concern is going with the low bid and then getting hit with lots of charges later. If we go with Avaya I prefer the company with the higher bid because they participated more in educating me about Avaya. Plus they are a known company, we have a maintenance contract with them on our PBX and we have experience with their subcontractor.

 

[pcunix]

Quick disclosure: I'm a Kerio reseller. But I do not sell anything else you'd need for this project, so I'm a disinterested bystander in that respect.

Just wondering two things: you may very well need features that Operator doesn't yet have, but did you actually demo it (I bet dollars to donuts you can find a dealer willing to loan you an Operator box if you don't want to use the software version) and did you look at MyPhone?

One of the big advantages I like for both the Operator and the Control boxes is the availability of the software versions. If the boxes should start belching acrid smoke one fine day, you can press a suitably interfaced computer or even VM into service, load up your configuration and be working again very, very quickly.

But if the features you need aren't there, they aren't there.

Tony Lawrence
Linux/Unix/Mac OS X Resources

http://aplawrence.com

 

[PaulChernoff]

Tony,

Thanks for the offer. We found a local Kerio Operator installer and they came and demoed the system for us. Very nice guys and I have confidence of their abilities. And the price is attractive. We tested with Snom phones since this is what Kerio recommended based on our preferred Avaya and Cisco phones and their customers' experiences. Once we tested the phones we preferred a less expensive Snom phone.

Right now we are going for Cisco (now has to be approved by building management since we are using Tenant Improvement funds) but Kerio is my plan B.

One strike against Avaya, which I did not know about until Monday, is the One-X Portal's use of Java. I am trying to eliminate Jave web browser plug-ins since Java is becoming the new Flash in terms of malware exploits. I am not worried about myself or my systems manager running Java, but I would prefer that the average person not be able to run Java through a web browser due to security concerns. After all, most people have been trained to give permission whenever the computer asks for it. I don't consider One-X Portal itself to be vulnerable and I have heard good things about it working with different versions of Java. My concern is more about the concept of running Java in a web browser. Funny, I wouldn't have worried about this 6 months ago. Any opinions about this issue are welcome.

 

[kwbMitel]

Better late than never. This is a truely unbiased opinion.

Find the best phone company in your area with the best reputation and buy what they sell.

These days, not much truely differentiates the systems. What truely stands apart is the service.

Now for the Biased opinion - As my handle might tell you, I like Mitel.


**********************************************
What's most important is that you realise ... There is no spoon.