Good point about not doing the hard sell on someone who is reluctant.
I don’t feel we make enough money on VoIP to twist someone’s arm, it’s there
mostly as a convenience for people who want it. If they don’t want it, fine.
Like people with FAX machines, I’d rather they keep a POTS line, or use eFAX
which is what I do. I recently had a guy with a new house with an elevator,
and he found out he was required to have an emergency phone in the elevator.
Sure enough, he found out it had to be POTS. Also we don’t really want “high
risk” service where failure could result in personal injury or damage to
property.
From: Chris Fabien via Af
Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2014 10:19 PM
To: af@afmug.com
Subject: Re: [AFMUG] Physically Hooking up Voip Lines
We do the installs same day, and explain to customer whatever will be required
to hook up their phones to the new service on number port day.
Like Ken, most are sold as a bundle, few add later. We don't have much
"convincing" to do usually, but if they start asking a lot of questions about
reliability/quality we steer them away from the voip service. Unlicensed
Wireless + VOIP is not the same as a landline, if that's the customer's
expectation it's probably not a good match.
On Sat, Sep 27, 2014 at 8:14 PM, Nate Burke via Af <af@afmug.com> wrote:
Do you schedule both the Wireless and ATA install on the same day, or are
they 2 installs? If they are the same day, how do you convince the customer of
switching their Phone over when they don't even have the service yet. Don't
they question your reliability since their sisters daughters ex-boyfriends
cousin had wireless once, and it dropped out this one time so it's not
reliable?
On 9/27/2014 4:35 PM, Ken Hohhof via Af wrote:
I forgot to address the due date issue. Like Jeremy, I try to schedule the
install on the porting due date. We don’t get an exact time, but ports usually
take effect around 8-9 am, rarely will it not be complete if you schedule a
late morning or an afternoon install.
Also note that many residential people use their landlines mostly to call
out, other people call them on their cellphones because they don’t know if they
will be home or not. Couple that with the fact that you can call out on the
VoIP line and have the caller ID show the right number even before it ports,
it’s the incoming calls that won’t get routed to the VoIP line until the number
ports. So if you can’t schedule the install the same day, many people will be
OK if you install it the day before.
If they are going to use exclusively a cordless phone, most people can
handle unplugging it from the wall and plugging it into the ATA on the morning
of the porting due date.
From: Chris Fabien via Af
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2014 3:44 PM
To: af@afmug.com
Subject: Re: [AFMUG] Physically Hooking up Voip Lines
We are moving toward strongly suggesting customers not use the house
wiring. Seen way too many issues with poor house wiring causing problems or
with damaged ATAs after lightning strikes.
Our experience, many houses have hacked up phone wiring that somehow works
OK for landline service but the ATAs don't tolerate it. Makes for a difficult
conversation explaining to customer who wired up their house with radioshack
phone cords and splitters, laying on ground in the wet crawlspace, why their
new VOIP service isn't reliable.
On Sat, Sep 27, 2014 at 1:10 PM, Jeremy via Af <af@afmug.com> wrote:
I install every VoIP customer for no additional charge. I know the port
date before it happens so I always schedule the install for that day, and let
them know when we begin the process that they may be without for a few hours on
the day that the porting completes. Most VoIP installs are simple, like two
minutes. Occasionally we run into the nightmare installs. I ask them and if
they just use one expandable cordless set I don't touch the wiring. Otherwise
we do the whole home install. I'd say the majority are whole home installs.
We try to make sure that we bring the wire into the hub whenever possible, or
near a phone jack. That way if they decide that they want VoIP down the road
it is an easy install. I always consider the potential VoIP install when doing
the wireless install.
On Sat, Sep 27, 2014 at 10:44 AM, Ken Hohhof via Af <af@afmug.com> wrote:
I will only rely on the customer to install the ATA if they are going
to plug a cordless base into it, no house wiring. Otherwise, they will forget
to disconnect the POTS line at the NID.
Most people have a cordless phone system, but they may also have an old
princess phone somewhere in the house, first try to convince them to ditch the
corded phones and not use the house wiring. Failing that, have your installer
tell them the router and ATA have to go near a phone jack.
If they insist on putting the ATA in a room with no phone jack and
still using the house wiring to reach corded phones, the professional way is
probably to install a surface mount jack and wire it like a phone guy would,
and charge them labor & materials.
If they have an old 900/2.4/5.8 cordless phone, you probably want them
to replace it with a new DECT system anyway, you can get systems with a whole
bunch of cordless handsets for not much money.
Perhaps people can be convinced by comparing to WiFi. It used to be
people would run Ethernet to every room to plug in their computers, no one does
this anymore, they want all their devices to be portable and use WiFi. Same
with phones, if you pick up the phone, you want to be able to move to another
room or even outside and take the phone with you.
If they really cannot go cordless or have the Internet installed to a
room with a phone jack, then charge them for installing a phone jack. It does
mean a few more parts an installer needs to carry. If you don't want to carry
RJ11 keystone jacks and surface mount boxes, there are cheap boxes with screw
terminals or I like the ones with 110 punchdown terminals. And you definitely
need red and yellow Scotchloks, those are what kill me, no matter how many I
buy, I can't find where I put them, so I end up buying more. I must have
thousands of Scothloks squirreled away by now, I think they go to the land of
missing socks.
-----Original Message----- From: Nate Burke via Af
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2014 11:28 AM
To: af@afmug.com
Subject: [AFMUG] Physically Hooking up Voip Lines
I'm interested in how people are doing physical Residential VoIP
Installs. Do you just provide the ATA and let the customer figure it
out, or do you physically hook it into the house wiring for them? We're
doing more and more, and it seems like it takes almost as much time to
do the Wireless install as it does to install the ATA. By the time you
track down the house wires, disconnect them from the PSTN, run a wire
from the ATA to where you can tie into the house wiring (not always
close by), and then wire the ATA in. The one's we're converting all
seem to have several corded phones they still want to use.
Also, how do you cover the crossover time between installation and
Number port. Business customer are one thing, I have them setup the
call forwarding feature at the ILEC, and forward calls to a temporary
DID until the port happens. But trying to get an older person to call
the ILEC and understand what they need to ask for (and not get sucked
into a new contract) is much more difficult.
I'm not sure how Vonage does it, do they walk people through tracing
down cables over the phone? Or once the number port happens, they
presume the ILEC port is dead, so then they just have the customer plug
it in to any wall jack?
Nate
