Integer IT recommends 3CX Telephony Communication as part of our supported vendor matrix. With voice, video calling, chat, and presence all delivered to any device, including handset, mobile or PC softphone. It also integrates with CRM, Microsoft 365 and even Microsoft Teams.

Why have we done this?

We have listened to our clients who want to make one phone call if they need help, rather than chasing the phone company, the internet provider or the IT support provider.

The big names in business telephony are pulling out of the onsite PBX market, as their traditional way of delivering telephony services becomes outdated, more costly, and unnecessarily complicated.

Samsung has withdrawn from the Australian market and Panasonic have announced they are doing the same. Other vendors are beginning to question the financial viability of the Australian market. In the meantime, handset-only businesses are booming, with the idea of hosted voice communications taking off.

Hosted is potentially too expensive for many because every person who has a handset must have a hosted licence just to use the phone. Adding to the burden is the cost of integration to other applications and Teams which adds more licences.

Attitudes to how we communicate over a telephony network have transformed dramatically over the last 12 months. People are no longer interested in whether a voice call is answered on a traditional handset, softphone via PC with USB headset, or a mobile device. The only important factor is that the call is answered. If the call is not able to be answered, we want the caller to have the ability to leave a voice message, and for us to know about it as soon as possible once the message is left.

It doesn’t seem like too much to ask, does it?

Telephony has undergone an enormous change because of the introduction of the NBN across Australia. Traditional voice communication is no longer delivered by a single connection, it is delivered as a data packet across an internet connection, the same way we have been sending data via emails for years.

This is why so many IT people talk about converged infrastructure; it’s just data or voice packets going down the same internet pipe, but handled differently at the receiving end.

How did it get so complicated?

As the industry has changed, it has also become complicated, with the boundaries of responsibility typically being split between:

1. The carrier, (Telstra, Optus, Commander etc), which sells internet connections and look after your telephony numbers;
2. The telephony company, which looks after the black box on the wall and/or hosts your numbers and delivers voice calls to the receiving device.
3. The IT company, which manages the physical network devices at your site and protects you from malicious intrusion with firewalls and routers.

It’s little wonder there’s so much confusion about who to call when the phones stop working; it could be caused by a fault anywhere in the chain above.

At Integer, we transformed our service model to manage all three of the above services directly. We have done this so our customers have only one number to call if the phones do not work.

Our main helpdesk in based in Port Macquarie and we respond to requests for help quickly. We take responsibility if there is a problem and we work through the process to resolution to ensure your phones are fully operational.