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Today's Topics:
1. Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP (Carlos Alvarez)
2. Re: Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP (Paul Timmins)
3. Re: Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
(Justin B Newman)
4. Re: Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP (Carlos Alvarez)
5. Re: Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP (Carlos Alvarez)
6. Re: Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP (Ryan Delgrosso)
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Message: 1
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 10:25:28 -0700
From: Carlos Alvarez <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID:
<CAFn1dUHuXpbCfJ=e5gj8az0-jlxaxw1snc7x7evi6dgasjv...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
I'm curious how other small VoIP providers handle having a fail-over for
their main (support) phone number in case their entire infrastructure is
unable to take calls. I know we all build in redundancy, but for the big
what-if scenario where nothing is available and the calls fail, you still
need to take your customer support calls.
We have one carrier who does PSTN failover, but they're far from our
primary or an ideal carrier for us. None of our major origination
providers do this.
--
Carlos Alvarez
TelEvolve
602-889-3003
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Message: 2
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 13:35:44 -0400
From: Paul Timmins <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; Format="flowed"
Put your tollfree on another resporg (or run your own resporg) and set
it up such that you can redirect your number to an answering service.
On 10/12/2012 01:25 PM, Carlos Alvarez wrote:
> I'm curious how other small VoIP providers handle having a fail-over
> for their main (support) phone number in case their entire
> infrastructure is unable to take calls. I know we all build in
> redundancy, but for the big what-if scenario where nothing is
> available and the calls fail, you still need to take your customer
> support calls.
>
> We have one carrier who does PSTN failover, but they're far from our
> primary or an ideal carrier for us. None of our major origination
> providers do this.
>
> --
> Carlos Alvarez
> TelEvolve
> 602-889-3003
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> VoiceOps mailing list
> [email protected]
> https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/voiceops
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Message: 3
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 12:37:24 -0500
From: Justin B Newman <[email protected]>
To: Carlos Alvarez <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID:
<CALTu_fy3W1uZV4s7SiLWACxSbnp4X24tYBFDhZN=xxuwcbx...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
On Fri, Oct 12, 2012 at 12:25 PM, Carlos Alvarez <[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm curious how other small VoIP providers handle having a fail-over for
> their main (support) phone number in case their entire infrastructure is
> unable to take calls. I know we all build in redundancy, but for the big
> what-if scenario where nothing is available and the calls fail, you still
> need to take your customer support calls.
>
> We have one carrier who does PSTN failover, but they're far from our primary
> or an ideal carrier for us. None of our major origination providers do
> this.
>
Over the years, I've done a variety of things. One that worked fairly
well was to provide subscribers an alternate "emergency only" #. It
goes to an answering service 24x7. Completely segregated
infrastructure (get the # from the answering service, or get a TF with
a carrier you don't use, and have it routed to the service). It always
works. And you have someone else taking the calls. If you've got an
outage scenario, you can instruct the answering service what message
to give callers - and you don't have a phone that has to be answered.
In reasonably high-end relationships, an escalation list with cell
phone #'s works. It's generally not mis-used, and if it is, well, time
to dump the customer.
I am aware of companies that figure that if their customers can't get
through on the phone, they should "get the message". Others rely on
the web, which, if built properly (no shared infrastructure) is an
easy way to communicate.
And ... PSTN failover doesn't deal with some failure scenarios inside
the provider. Even the biggest of the big sometimes have regional
catastrophic failures.
-jbn
PS: As I hit send, I see an incoming message from Paul Timmins who
appears to also be a fan of an answering service, although with a good
twist.
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 11:03:27 -0700
From: Carlos Alvarez <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID:
<CAFn1dUH2hSUb5sfLyrYZ0QdWMR4hiDpfYJNqv=ux9wiftcf...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
On Fri, Oct 12, 2012 at 10:35 AM, Paul Timmins <[email protected]> wrote:
> Put your tollfree on another resporg (or run your own resporg) and set
> it up such that you can redirect your number to an answering service.
>
I guess I should have clarified that this is a local number, not toll-free.
Changing it now is possible, though not simple. It's hard enough to get
people to stop calling the sales person's DID after they become a customer
and need support.
I see there are other responses that I haven't read, but thought I should
provide this clarification right away.
--
Carlos Alvarez
TelEvolve
602-889-3003
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Message: 5
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 11:11:13 -0700
From: Carlos Alvarez <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID:
<cafn1duhnirrrboh8bkn0tccr1jrhtwdxo_vpo6kajow_eet...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
On Fri, Oct 12, 2012 at 10:37 AM, Justin B Newman <[email protected]> wrote:
> Over the years, I've done a variety of things. One that worked fairly
> well was to provide subscribers an alternate "emergency only" #. It
> goes to an answering service 24x7. Completely segregated
>
As noted in a previous message, we have issues just getting people to call
the main number instead of a sales DID, so I'm not sure how we'd educate
them on this. I like the idea from a technical level though.
> In reasonably high-end relationships, an escalation list with cell
> phone #'s works. It's generally not mis-used, and if it is, well, time
> to dump the customer.
>
Our high end customers do have our cell numbers, and they don't abuse them.
We had one abuser and as you said, we simply fired the customer. But we
really don't want to give that to all customers because the smaller ones do
abuse it. Not on purpose, they just go, oh let's call this cell everyone
always answers that. They end up trying to use it as the first number they
call. Took us years to undo that.
> I am aware of companies that figure that if their customers can't get
> through on the phone, they should "get the message". Others rely on
> the web, which, if built properly (no shared infrastructure) is an
> easy way to communicate.
>
Yes, I wish people would look to our help desk first (outsourced) but only
maybe 10% do. The rest pick up the phone if they have a problem. Some
time ago we had one major outage and everyone tried to call first, then
were upset that our main number didn't work. Although we've done a lot of
redundancy improvement since then, I'd still like to have an absolute fail
safe on that number.
> And ... PSTN failover doesn't deal with some failure scenarios inside
> the provider. Even the biggest of the big sometimes have regional
> catastrophic failures.
>
This is true, but we have our DIDs and main numbers with different
carriers. When we've experienced an origination carrier issue, people can
get through on the personal contact DID number.
--
Carlos Alvarez
TelEvolve
602-889-3003
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Message: 6
Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2012 17:07:10 -0700
From: Ryan Delgrosso <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [VoiceOps] Main number fail-safe solution for small ITSP
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; Format="flowed"
We have established trunks directly from one or more of our carriers
directly into our office phone system and now do not run much of our own
office systems over our own network explicitly to prevent this sort of
nightmare scenario from playing out.
Obviously at that point your selection in origination carriers may
become the trouble point, so I would make sure the origination carrier
is truly carrier grade, or you can publish multiple support contact
numbers which come through different carriers.
Also consider leveraging out of band communications for that nightmare
scenario where the infrastructure has experienced some kind of critical
failure and realistically your poor support team will be unable to do
anything save for act as customer punching bags. Twitter, livechat
systems and announcement webpages can all be excellent for communicating
with your customers in these scenarios.
On 10/12/2012 10:25 AM, Carlos Alvarez wrote:
> I'm curious how other small VoIP providers handle having a fail-over
> for their main (support) phone number in case their entire
> infrastructure is unable to take calls. I know we all build in
> redundancy, but for the big what-if scenario where nothing is
> available and the calls fail, you still need to take your customer
> support calls.
>
> We have one carrier who does PSTN failover, but they're far from our
> primary or an ideal carrier for us. None of our major origination
> providers do this.
>
> --
> Carlos Alvarez
> TelEvolve
> 602-889-3003
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> VoiceOps mailing list
> [email protected]
> https://puck.nether.net/mailman/listinfo/voiceops
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