e911 Compliance… How New Rules & Legislation Protect Your People and Visitors

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New federal regulations have been passed that will impact emergency 911 calling from businesses: Kari’s Law and Ray Baum’s Act. These mandates are intended to protect everyone in your office or building – employees and visitors – by improving access to emergency services:

  • Kari’s Law applies to newly installed multi-line telephone systems. Users must be able to directly call emergency services by dialing 911 without having to dial a prefix to reach an outside line.
  • Ray Baum’s Act requires that 911 emergency operators be provided with the specific location of the calling party so that appropriate assistance can be dispatched to that location.

FCC order and detailed rules here

If you’re planning a new telephone system, you should be aware of these requirements and ensure that your providers’ offerings can comply with these government mandates.

Compliance Challenges

As you take steps to comply with the new 911 rules, you’ll want to keep in mind several factors – including the technology used in your Voice and IT environment, network topology, and the geographic scope of your phone system deployment.

Also, many states have adopted their own 911 regulations which may contribute to compliance confusion.

Need help with e911 calling compliance in your business? TCI can help. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 



Why Workforce Management Solutions are Essential for Contact Centers and Your Business Profitability

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With growing demand for a consistent contact center experience regardless of channel – in combination with more complex customer requests – implementing and using a sophisticated Workforce Management (WFM) solution is essential for business profitability.

Whitepaper: What is Workforce Management – Download PDF

Improved Forecasting

Cutting-edge WFM solutions allow for tweaking and fine-tuning your forecasting process. Too high a forecast and agents are idle, as are the workstations – a waste of resources. Too low a forecast and customers get annoyed by long waiting times. Agents become overworked and drained, negatively impacting performance and absenteeism. Without accurate forecasting, your business runs the risk of losing customers, and acquiring new ones requires much more work and resources.

Overtime Savings

Another area that can be addressed by WFM is overtime. It’s easy to reason that a few minutes here and there can’t make much difference, but that number adds up quickly and significantly, affecting pay raises and performance bonuses in the long run. With WFM, thresholds can be set up to keep an eye on scheduled time and keep track of overtime, taking corrective measures if necessary. The solution also makes it easy to determine whether it makes more sense to add staff or plan for a few hours of overtime a week.

Leveraging Simulations

With WFM tools, you’ll be able to monitor, measure, and carry out simulations that test and evaluate a range of parameters to identify those that are essential to organizational performance. Should you invest more resources in making forecasting accuracy as close to perfect as possible OR will this result only if you succeed in improving scheduling that’s suffering from a dip in early morning peaks? Where should you act first for the best results at minimum cost?

Mitel WFM Product Overview Brochure – Download PDF

Talk with the TCI team about your contact center and WFM technology requirements to ensure customer and agent satisfaction while maintaining efficiency and profitability. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.



Why it’s Time to Make Your Move to the Cloud

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Whether your old phone system can’t be upgraded anymore, or you need to enable remote work, or a new regulatory requirement can’t be supported, at some point you’ll have to hang up your trusted old phones and move to the cloud. Here’s what you can look forward to…

Simplify Communication, Management, and Budgeting

When you combine flexible communications, mobility, and the cloud, borders disappear, barriers collapse, costs drop, and productivity rises. If these sound like the kind of advantages you want to bring to your business, let’s talk about a move to TCI Host, our customized Cloud Voice service.

  • Talk, Chat, Share & Meet – TCI Host offers all the features of advanced on-premises platforms without the hardware and management headaches. Plus, you get the unlimited scalability, seamless mobility, and open integrated technology that you’ve been looking for to bring your business communications and business intelligence together.
  • Any Device. Anywhere. Anytime Communications – TCI Host fits into the way your office team works. Use a desktop phone, smartphone, or softphone on your laptop. Just one phone system supporting your business no matter when and where your team is working – office, home, or branch locations.
  • We deliver & set up everything – Unlike many providers, who will drop-ship phones and expect you to install and configure everything, our certified Cloud Voice experts come to you and set up everything to your specifications. After we install it, we’ll test everything to make sure it all runs smoothly.

With Cloud Voice, your team can deliver an exceptional Customer Experience. More competitive advantages to look forward to…

  • Be more productive – Bring all of your communications tools into one cloud and one application for a seamless experience on any device – anywhere in the world. Easily manage voice, email, and IM from a single screen to reduce management complexity and boost productivity.
  • No hardware, no headaches – Say goodbye to capital expenses, maintenance, and service fees with a hosted business phone system. You get great call quality, industry-leading reliability, and an easy-to-manage phone system with no upfront costs – everything you need for one low monthly price.
  • Free up IT resources – Don’t waste valuable IT resources on aging PBX hardware. With TCI Host, you enjoy new features faster, you can add or remove lines in minutes, and you always stay up to date with automated upgrades.
  • Pay as you grow – Unlike premises-based PBX systems, TCI Host always provides just the right amount of capacity at the right time to ensure you’re paying for only what you need and not a penny more.
  • Keep your business running – TCI’s cloud-based hosting platform can deliver ultra-high reliability and seamless disaster recovery so you always stay connected with colleagues and customers.

TCI can help you migrate to a cloud solution customized for your business needs. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

5 Ways Your Current Phone System Can Limit Your Success

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Has your phone system kept pace with the times? More importantly, is it capable of helping you meet tomorrow’s challenges? Here, we outline five attributes you’ll want to consider when you’re thinking about improving your technology.

1. Ability to Add Features and Functionality

Make sure your phone system can keep pace with technological change and has the ability to embrace cloud-based applications and customized solutions as required. Look for these features and attributes:

  • Third-party integrations allow you to take advantage of cloud-based business process applications.
  • Easy & intuitive communications tools that are as simple as consumer apps will speed adoption.
  • Admin portal enables users to make real-time changes to preferences, permissions and groups.
  • Flexible service plans enable users to change service plans in real time as their needs change.

2. Productivity

Is your phone system boosting worker productivity or draining it? Reduce employee frustration and increase productive work time with these features:

  • Find me – Follows employees so they can get the call the first time around, regardless of the device they are using.
  • Presence – Enables employees to see when other co-workers are available, in a meeting, on a call or out of the office.
  • Collaboration tools – Makes it easier to exchange ideas and get work done with video, instant messaging and file and desktop sharing.
  • Application integration – Boosts the power of your CRM by seamlessly integrating calling features, call histories and customer data.

3. Scalability

Nearly every organization can benefit from the agility that comes from aligning its phone system with business needs. Look for these attributes:

  • Plug-and-play – Provides phones that are easy to install without costly upgrades.
  • Flexibility – Easily scales to support both the office and your mobile workforce.
  • Reduced complexity – Avoids complications that add costs and hinder your ability to scale.
  • Intuitive – Supports easy deployment by administrators and enables users to quickly be productive.
  • Simple licensing – Delivers flexible licensing so businesses can scale up or down as their needs change.

4. Mobility

Does your current phone system provide the same easy features and functionality to all staff members, no matter their location or device? If not, consider these capabilities:

  • Mobile applications – Allows personal devices to be integrated with your phone network.
  • Connectivity – Wi-Fi/cellular call handover to stay connected everywhere.
  • Collaboration tools – Provides team and video collaboration, instant messaging, and conferencing to facilitate greater collaboration from anywhere.
  • Security – Delivers features that keep voice and signaling safe, even in public hot spots.

5. Your Budget

Consider whether a CapEx or OpEx budgeting approach makes more sense:

  • Purchasing a standalone system can add complexity and require additional staff and time-consuming administration, resulting in greater costs over time.
  • Consider productivity-boosting options to upgrade your system in an easy-to-manage way that frees up IT resources and saves money.
  • Add new capabilities that seamlessly work with your existing system as your business needs change – without having to pay for features you don’t need.
  • If your system needs a complete overhaul, it may be cheaper to move to the cloud.

Communications are vital to your organization’s success. If your current phone system is holding you back, it’s time to discuss an upgrade. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.