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Indy Business: How Does e911 Work?

Have you ever wondered how 911 calling actually works? With old analog telephone service provided by the phone companies, the call would route through local stations that could transfer it to local emergency services. But what about for Indianapolis VoIP phone service like we provide? How does it get where it needs to go?

Area codes mean nothing.

Before voice-over IP and cell phones, area codes mattered. But now mobile phones, home phones, and business phones can use numbers from any area code for the same cost as their local area code. A Seattle area code can be routed to Indiana, and vice-versa. So clearly a 911 call can’t route just based on the area code anymore. Even if it could, how would you route a toll-free number?

The answer to that is actually pretty clever.

We know where you live.

When we provision a new number and allow it to send calls, we can also enable something called e911. This is a service that provides extra information with the caller ID. Let’s use our number for example and say it’s provisioned to the Soldiers and Sailors Monument.

Here’s what happens:

911 is called from a phone; the caller ID is set to 317-644-0075; and we have in our system that when that number calls 911, the location tied to it is 1 Monument Cir, Indianapolis, IN 46204. So before the emergency dispatcher can even answer the call, they know that the call is probably coming from that address. If the phone dies or the caller can’t give them much information, they at least know where to start looking.

Of course, the dispatcher would still ask for the caller’s current location because they know that what it says in the system may not be where the phone is located. And that’s pretty much it. We solve the problem of mobility by sending a little extra data along with the call.

Hopefully this post has clarified some of the mystery around current e911 calling. Feel free to contact us about our voip phone service, or give us a call if you have any questions. Thanks, and have a great day!

Indy Business: Best Phone System 2018

Indy Business: Best Business Phone System 2018

Choosing between business phone systems can be more than confusing if you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for. Do you want a traditional system or a voice-over IP (VoIP) system? How many lines do the systems support? How do they hook up to your phone service provider?

Today, we’ll try to answer these questions as best we can.

Go digital.

We will be recommending a system in a minute; but no matter what system you buy, it should be digital. Digital systems are everywhere and their call quality is crystal clear compared to old analog systems. While we’re at it, you might as well go with a voice-over IP system too. Most systems (including our recommendation) work regardless of your phone service provider, so there’s nothing to fear when it comes to compatibility.

Digital VoIP phone systems also usually offer more lines for the money. When a call is going over your network as opposed to using traditional phone wiring, the number of calls doesn’t matter nearly as much. So voice-over IP is more efficient.

Our recommendation.

The system we like best is from Grandstream. Specifically, a system made up of Grandstream GXP2130’s. That system would offer up to 3 lines per phone, the phones themselves would be reliable and professional, setup wouldn’t be too complicated, and the quality you get for the price can’t be beat. We’ve looked at the alternatives from Mitel, Polycom, Cisco, etc. We still prefer the high-end line of Grandstream phones.

We’re also going to recommend using the system with a hosted VoIP provider like ourselves. You could use it with an on-site Grandstream PBX, but that’s a piece of hardware you don’t really need and if your office goes offline, all your inbound call functions are offline too.

Still need help?

If you still have questions or aren’t sure if our recommendation would work in your location, feel free to contact us anytime. After all, sometimes you just need to ask an expert!

Indy Business: Hosted VoIP Perks

Should you have your phone server on-site? Or should it be hosted in the cloud? It’s an important decision to make for any business, but there are some benefits to having your PBX hosted off-site. Let’s take a look at some of the perks of hosting to help you decide.

The cloud’s ISP is better than yours.

With today’s cloud infrastructure, having a hosted VoIP PBX usually means 100% uptime. Unlike your office building, the internet service going to a hosted phone server is more reliable, faster, and doesn’t have any data caps. That means that when your local internet inevitably goes offline, your incoming calls are still hitting your phone server and your customers can still access you in a number of ways.

With a hosted PBX like our VoIP Indianapolis uses, your customers can:

Hear all prerecorded messages you’ve created.
Leave you a voicemail.
Be routed to another office or even a cell phone.

Most of that is not possible if your PBX is located on-site. When your local internet is down, your PBX is down too.

No hardware changes. No upgrades.

For hosted VoIP, you shouldn’t ever have to worry about hardware failure or updating outdated components. Your PBX’s hard drive never gets errors. Your power supply never overheats. And your processor never gets too old. After 5, 10, or 20 years, the phone server doesn’t need to be replaced, because it is regularly upgraded in the cloud without any loss of service to you and your business.

Also, power outages, lightning strikes, and power surges never take your phone server offline. So that’s a plus!

Deciding between on-site and hosted.

It can be tough to choose between on-site and hosted VoIP. Typically, we recommend a cloud hosted VoIP like ours; but not all businesses are a good fit for its benefits. If you’d like help choosing between the two, please feel free to contact us or call us anytime. Thanks, and have a great day!

Indy Business: Unwanted Spam Calls

With the growing problem of unwanted and fraudulent spam calls, more and more people are asking if anything can be done about it. There are apps and services available for cell phones, but what can you do about spam business and residential calls? In this post, we’d like to highlight some of the ways to decrease or eliminate telemarketing calls.

Talk to your provider.

Not all providers will let you block unwanted calls, but it’s worth finding out. For example, we will block calls for both our business phone service and our home phone service. Not only can we block a number or a whole area code, but the way we block it makes spammers believe your number has been disconnected even though everyone else can call you normally. It’s a great tool for removing your number from spam call lists.

Also, if your provider says they don’t block unwanted calls, consider porting your number to one that will.

Let your phone do the talking.

Because so many of the spam calls are automated, why not automate your answer to them? With modern phone systems, it’s extremely simple to create an answering service that screens your calls. Just requiring the caller to press a single button is enough to stop most telemarketers. And you can combine this method with call blocking to virtually eliminate unwanted calls.

Get extreme.

As a last resort, you can choose to only allow calls from a list of trusted numbers. Instead of blocking bad callers when they contact you, you start by assuming every call is bad until you say otherwise. This is guaranteed to eliminate unwanted calls, though you may miss some legitimate calls from people whose number hasn’t been whitelisted.

Whatever you choose to do, it’s important for all of us to make it as hard as possible for spammers to succeed. The moment their activities are no longer profitable, they will stop engaging in them.

If you want help fighting your spam calls, or want to switch to a phone company that does all it can, feel free to contact us or give us a call anytime. Thanks and have a great day!

Indy Business: Best Business Phone

Over our 10-plus years providing phone service, we have used and recommended a ton of business phones. We can safely say the current best business phone for most people is the Grandstream GXP2130. It has a professional look and feel, comes with all the features a modern business needs, works as well or better than more expensive options, and can be used with most VoIP phone service.

Look and feel.

The GXP2130 has a solid construction and feels nice in the hand, like many desk phones available today. Where the GXP2130 really stands out, though, is its color screen and intuitive interface. We wish the screen was a touch screen; but for under $70, it is hard to complain about a button-operated screen. Plus the buttons around the screen are all placed well and the screen changes to clearly show their function at all times.

All other buttons are labeled with helpful icons that show what they do. The call transfer button shows a phone pointing to another phone. The do-not-disturb button shows a microphone with a line through it. The hold call button shows a pause symbol, etc. We’ve also found these icons to be easier to learn and recognize at a glance than text labels like other brands use.

Features.

Like most SIP desk phones, the GXP2130 is completely customizable, but the majority of users will never need to customize them. From the moment they are provisioned, local time and weather displays on the screen, and the default buttons are programmed to work out of the box. The only unclear settings that users may wish to set are two SIP security options which will eliminate any phantom call issues. Those settings can be found by following these instructions.

Try before you buy.

We doubt you’ll have any issues with the Grandstream GXP2130, but please feel free to contact us or give us a call if you’d like to try them before buying. We offer free trials of our recommended phone hardware and phone service because we’ve seen how much customers appreciate it.

Thanks for reading our thoughts and have a great day!

icon-ambulance Indy Business: How Does e911 Work?

icon-building Indy Business: Best Business Phone System 2018

icon-cloud-upload Indy Business: Hosted VoIP Perks

icon-ban Indy Business: Unwanted Spam Calls

icon-phone-square Indy Business: Best Business Phone

Indy Business: How Does e911 Work?

Indy Business: Best Business Phone System 2018

Indy Business: Hosted VoIP Perks

Indy Business: Unwanted Spam Calls

Indy Business: Best Business Phone