I have been asked many times if it is safe to entrust a key communication tool to a hosted telephony platform.

I have had a mantra that I use almost weekly since I joined Star.  “It’s the network that makes the difference”.  This is never truer than when we are talking about hosted real-time communication solutions, i.e. voice and video.  The features and functionality of a unified communications service is reliant on different users being able to interact.

If you look at the components of a hosted VoIP telephone system you can break it to 3 or 4 main parts

1)      The core platform

2)      The telephone

3)      The bit in the middle – the local network and the wide area network

The core platforms are really built for stability.  There will be multiple servers at multiple locations with multiple routes in and out.  So failures here are extremely rare, in fact the up times of these platforms will be higher than an on premise phone system (PBX).

Over the last 10 years I have seen a lot of different phones.  The newer IP phones from the larger manufacturers are now easy to use, set up and have an extremely low failure rate (less than 1% over 3 years).

So we come to the networks.  The LAN is one area the customer has control of.  With good guide lines on the network configuration this is easily set up to support IP telephony.  The WAN then becomes probably the key area for success.  Anyone looking at buying a telecommunication solution should select the right network supplier and look at ways to build in resilient links.

The wide area network should be fully managed and have the right QoS and security profiles on it.  Ideally, look for one organization who will manage every aspect of the solution outside your building.  This is the only way to guarantee that the voice call gets from the core phone system to the users phone every time.

That is why my mantra has been “it’s the network that makes the difference”.