Looking for recommendation : Business phone systems?

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Right now we are using an archaic box in the back of the building that routes numbers to 8 conference type phones. We pay for this service, although after initial set up they are mostly not needed...add this service to the phone bill with two lines and we are paying an arm and a leg.

As with most things "If it ain't broke don't fix it?"

We're coming up on contract renewal and I'm thinking we should move into the modern era.


So what do you guys use?? Looked at things like Ooma business and other VOIP services that come with fancy auto attendants, on hold music that can be selling your product, freeing up our poor secretary....Do these things work?

I picture it like this....You buy the hub and bases for each phone, only need a good internet connection (no physical phone lines $$) and pay them a fee for the service which costs much less and has more features that we currently have?

Am I missing something?

 

[chester215]

We use comcast for our voip and an xblue hub that takes 6 incoming lines with a bunch of phone handsets.
Has worked well for us since we also use comcast for our internet with a static ip address and they gave us a package deal.
We are in Ct and it was the best solution for us when it was set up a few years ago.

 

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But, but, phone/cable company bad. right? Saw the xblue hub...you have to buy the VOIP service from someone to use it right?

 

[Kevin-shopVOX]

ooma.com perhaps?

 

[Charlie J]

We use Ringcentral. Love it.

 

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We use Ringcentral. Love it.

Just got off the phone with ring central they seem pretty legit. Did you get the premium package?

 

[Charlie J]

I just have their two line plan. We're a small shop.

 

[chester215]

But, but, phone/cable company bad. right? Saw the xblue hub...you have to buy the VOIP service from someone to use it right?

It depends on who you want to give your money to.
In our case comcast business service has been great and at the time we signed up it was less than the other services we looked at.
I don't remember if it was because of a toll free # we have or not.
I do have an ooma hooked into one of the lines.

 

[Rodan68]

We use Grasshopper here. It forwards calls to your cell phone and everyone here has their own cell phone. It uses an
auto attendant and can have as many lines as you want.

 

[BIG EASY DOES IT]

shoretel

https://www.shoretel.com/why-shoret...orth_America&gclid=COjynvONi8gCFUNcfgodrVYNEw

Amazing customer service. It's a VOIP phone service. I loved it when we had it at my old job. All your voicemails, missed calls, address books all on your computer. Scroll through click which one you you want to call and click call and pick up your phone. Caller ID pops up on your computer window when someone calls. It's great and they will fully customize everything to your needs. There are alot more options that we never used.

 

[TXFB.INS]

ring-central here, been very pleased with the service and functionality.


NOTE: as with all VOIP systems, you are using the internet. which means that you will need a good connection, have the ability knowledge to set a dedicated amount of the bandwidth for the phone usage.
otherwise whenever you are uploading/downloading large files you will get spotty call quality

 

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Comes down to setting up QoS on router I guess...or buying more bandwidth.

 

[BIG EASY DOES IT]

We use Grasshopper here. It forwards calls to your cell phone and everyone here has their own cell phone. It uses an
auto attendant and can have as many lines as you want.

This sounds pretty cool. So there is only one shop phone number. Everyone calls that and then selects a person they would like to talk to and it forwards to their cell?

 

[HDvinyl]

Ring Central has the same capability.

I've been a customer of theirs for 9 years and have 3 numbers with them.

Fax is included in your minutes.

Very friendly user interface.

 

[Rodan68]

This sounds pretty cool. So there is only one shop phone number. Everyone calls that and then selects a person they would like to talk to and it forwards to their cell?

Exactly. Only one shop number and they'll set up a toll free number if you want one. The only downside is that the caller ID on your cell will show as your shop number on all calls going through system. It's no big deal for us though.

 

[dale911]

A few years ago I owned a florist. We had 4 phone lines that rolled over and a fax line as well as another line that I was never able to figure out where it went but was paying for because the previous owner paid for it. We were paying almost $500 per month. Switched to ring central and used our own phones. I bought cordless phones from Amazon for voip and was able to have all 4 lines on those cordless phones. The best thing was that because I only had the main base station, I was able to use only one voip phone line and just paid a fee of a few dollars per line every month for the other phone numbers. I paid about $800 for the phones but then only paid about $69 a month after that. Also had it set up so that if we had a bunch of people out of the shop, we forwarded the phones to a cell phone. Super awesome at Ring Central. I will never buy an analog phone system again.