To some of you, who are coming up on their TelCo contacts, there is another option available today to connect your telephone system to the outside world. Besides the familiar T1/PRI Voice and Analog Lines, SIP trunking has been cannibalizing the old connectivity options. Based on SIP protocol, which powers most of worlds telecommunications networks, video calls, and mobile phone networks. SIP Trunking allows you to utilize the you high speed broadband connection to receive dial tone. Let's review the 10 reasons and benefits of switching over to SIP Trunking Services.
- Migrate without Upgrade: If your system is somewhat "ARCHAIC", and all you have today is either analog lines or T1/PRI connectivity. No worry, you can still switch to SIP Trunking service without any hardware upgrades. Special gateway devices that provide backwards compatibility to analog or T1/PRI interfaces are available on the market. We recommend AdTran or EdgeWater Network devices.
- Use the Bandwidth: SIP Trunking is services that utilizes internet connections supplied by the customer. This can range from optical networks such as FiOS, to coaxial Cable services and DSL. Old fashioned T1 provides you with a limited bandwidth pipe of 1.5M, where high-speed internet connectivity can deliver up to 50M pipe, thus allowing you greater throughput. Read on, for ultimate cost savings.
- Features, Features, Features: When migrating away from analog lines, most companies look for advanced features, such as: Direct Inward Dialing, Caller ID Outpulsing ( a.k.a Direct Outward Dialing) and my favorite Caller ID Pass-Through. These and other advanced features are available via SIP Trunking services, without the expenses and hardware upgrades that come with T1/PRI services.
- Multi-Carrier Redundancy: For most businesses, multiple internet carriers are available in your building, you can diversify your voice connectivity with SIP Trunking. Allowing you not to rely on a single pipe. Thus, allowing you to deliver high speed fiber optic internet (i.e. FiOS) in conjunction with DSL or Cable Internet as additional fail over in case of carrier outage.
- More Trunks, More Capacity: For business that handle somewhat high call volume, adding a secondary T1/PRI, easily doubles the monthly telecommunication costs. T1/PRI can handle a maximum of 23 simultaneous in/our calls. SIP Trunk's only limitation is is the bandwidth pipe you provide. Thus allowing you to increase call capacity without adding any circuits, and accommodate additional trunks to your call volume needs.
Most of the SIP Trunks carriers support two codecs G.711 ( 64kbps) and G.729 ( 8Kbps), now you can do the math on how many phone calls can be handled on an average broadband connection of 12Mbps down and 5Mpbs up from Comcast. This has been the key component for global carrier to convert their backbones to SIP in 1980's. - Multi-Site Redundancy: For a geographically distributed business SIP Trunks allow automatic call diversion in case of a connectivity failure. You don't to have to sit in dark and on the phone waiting for your carrier to setup forwarding. This requires some planning ahead, but is highly beneficial for business continuity.
- Controls, Controls, Controls: SIP Trunks providers provide you with control panel where you can manually or automatically upon failure control the delivery of the calls. Diverting 40 direct dials to 40 mobile phones in case of catastrophic failure takes about 10 minutes or less. Doing the same with your T1/PRI carrier is impossible and typically requires you to listen to "cruel" on-hold messages for extensive amounts of time. T1/PRI carriers typically offer a 4-hour SLA, which means they not in the rush to divert your calls.
- Flexible Contracts: Typically the contacts are either annual or month-to-month. Additionally scaling up or down is usually not a problem. This is a big advantage for seasonal businesses such as CPA/Tax firms.
- Significant Cost Savings: Average price for a single SIP Trunk is about $25/month. This includes unlimited US/Canada calling and very cost effective international dialing, along with typical features such as Caller ID, DID etc.
Now you should be looking at your T1/PRI bill, monthly charge, FCC charges, Recovery Costs, and Metered Call Costs….do the math. Most business will realize 40% to 60% savings on their monthly TelCo costs + added functionality and business continuity options. - IT PAYS TO SWITCH: Getting your $1200/monthly T1/PRI expense down to $600/month, leaves you some cash in your pocket. This allows you to upgrade your "ARCHAIC" system into brand new, cutting edge, advanced IP-PBX system installed by Boston Voice Networks (yeap…sales pitch!).
SIP Trunking offers significant cost savings and features otherwise not available with old-fashioned connectivity options. Migration to SIP Trunking is a complex process that requires professionals to to properly setup your PBX, provision connectivity, QoS setting , traffic shapping, and handle the turn-ups, testing and number porting. Also remember, not all SIP Trunk providers are made equal. Contact your local PBX vendor for to consultation and planning.
