Surviving a Tough Economy with TeleVantage

Part One: Easily Manage Organizational Changes In-House

With talk of the economy saturating the media and every expert providing a different economic forecast, it can be difficult to see the light through the forest. Recent reports have stated that the U.S. economy has stabilized and is expected to recover in 2010, which is a bright spot. However, surviving the impacts of the economic downturn until then is a challenge for most SMBs.

Many SMBs are combating this difficult period by reorganizing existing staff, while some others are continuing to grow, albeit at a slower pace, adding additional staff only as needed. When these changes occur, TeleVantage users have a clear advantage over companies with traditional phone systems.

Managing a traditional phone system can be time-consuming and costly. TeleVantage puts the control in your hands, allowing your administrator to easily make moves, adds or changes via the intuitive Graphical User Interface – your Administrator ViewPoint. This ViewPoint gives your designated administrator(s) onscreen access to all system administration functions from any PC on the network or by remote network log on.

Reorganizing staff

Your administrator can easily grant or revoke dialing permissions, as well as change user settings such as mailbox size, password length and the frequency with which employees must change passwords. Changes to these settings can be made individually or en masse (e.g. size of all voicemail boxes in a given department). The administrator can also easily point and click to update auto attendants and call flow if needed.

Adding New Users

The ViewPoint makes it easy for your administrator to add new trunks and new user extensions, and assign permissions to those new users – again simply by pointing and clicking. And, the new user can either use the desktop phone, or his or her standard ViewPoint once logged in, to quickly create and apply a voice title and general and alternate voice mail greetings to ensure they are included in the auto attendant.

Unlike traditional phone systems that must be shut down to make modifications, TeleVantage allows your administrator to make moves, adds and changes in-house and while the system is up and running. So your business can continue to run as usual – a critical advantage during this economic downturn when every dollar made truly counts.

In the event that your company has changed administrators, or if your long-time administrator simply needs to brush up on to implement moves, adds and changes, Alternate Access offers a brush-up administrator training session. For a modest fee and about one hour of your administrator’s time, we can help get his or her skills back in tip-top condition.

When you do need vendor support to make a substantial configuration change, Alternate Access is here to assist you. Most adjustments can be made via remote access to your system, and we will get you back to the business of running your business as quickly as possible. Simply call our technical support team at 919-831-4260 or e-mail support@AlternateAccess.com.

Part Two: Seamlessly Move Your Phone System to a New Location

Last month we reviewed ways that TeleVantage makes it easy to manage organizational changes in-house. What if your company has bigger changes on the horizon – such as moving to a new location altogether? Luckily your TeleVantage system, and Alternate Access, can help ease the typical pains of an office move.

If you decide to move your business to a new location, call Alternate Access and request a customized move plan. For a modest fee, we will visit and assess your new site, and we will recommend ways to ensure the move of your phone system is seamless and cost-effective.

Our experts will check aspects such as cabling and layout of the server room to ensure that any upfit is done correctly and economically. We will also evaluate current long distance, fax communication and cell phone bills to determine any potential areas of cost savings. We will recommend ways to maintain your institutional memory, ensuring that customer data is maintained and protected when you move.

By design, TeleVantage can be moved with minimal downtime. Having a move plan, created by one of our system experts, will further minimize business interruption so that your business can be up and running as usual – as quickly as possible. During these tough economic times, no business can afford long operational delays. 

TeleVantage eases the pains of office moves in other ways. For instance, you can customize the company’s auto attendant to inform callers of the impending move. After the move, the auto attendant can be changed to alert callers to the business’s new address. Similarly, any on-hold messaging could be altered to alert callers of this information. And because a properly configured TeleVantage system is easily restored, once the system has been relocated, getting it up and running happens quickly.

If your system requires a substantial configuration change, Alternate Access is here to assist you. Many adjustments can be made via remote access to your system, and we will get you back to the business of running your business as quickly as possible. For more information on setting up your move plan, contact us at 919-831-4260 or e-mail support@AlternateAccess.com.