Phone Systems

[Michael]

Hi all,

 

What kind of phone systems are you using in your school/MAT? Please select all that apply! TIA!

Edited February 25, 2019 by Michael

[TechMonkey]

We still have some PSTN lines for alarm systems, a redundant fax line and a backup line for IT testing, but I didn't put them in as they aren't really part of our phone system. I can edit if needed and it is possible. Our phone system is 3CX hosted locally, looking at the possibility if it being cloud hosted but it isn't really cost effective at the moment without other factors being taken into account.

[Michael]

Thank you - all feedback is good.

 

Although some alarm systems do use phone lines, you're right that they're outside the scope of this poll. You'd probably still need at least one line even if using VOIP.

[Sonic007]

We havve recently redone our phone system to VOIP. Very easy to use and phones/users can be moved around easily.

Still have a traditional line for alarm system.

[Michael]

Any more contributions to this poll?

[Michael]

One more bump for more votes. Thanks again peeps!

[PlantHead]

Just going through tenders for a new phone system now - we are edging towards a hosted VOIP system with a mirror in the cloud for DR purposes.

[synaesthesia]

Voted last option (mobiles) - this is via BTs OnePhone system which works rather well especially for roaming staff.

[howartp]

We have an Avaya IP Office 500.

 

What do you class that as in your poll options?

 

It's Voice Over Ethernet with ISDN incoming line(s), not Voice Over IP, therefore isn't VOIP or PSTN?

[nwkeene]

we have Avaya IP Office too... with voicemail pro. 250 odd staff, probably 150 extentions accross 2 sites, all on our internal LAN. Paid for itself in 9 months over phone line rental etc.

[leeshellard]

Looking at phone system right now. Had quotes for Avaya and 3cx but not really sure what is best? Anyone have experiance of both?

[Andy2789]

We are currently going through the process of looking for a new system, we have settled on a Mitel system as have most schools around us. Anyone else using this and have any pointers?

[Andycat]

We had demos from 3cx, Mitel and went with Avaya.

[Scrumpy]

Just voted for "On Premises VOIP" as we're moving to this very shortly. Currently on an Avaya IP Office system over PSTN, which is ok, but the support from our BT Local business (who are nothing to do with BT, just giving BT a bad name if that's possible) has been xxxx, and we're desperate to get away from them and their rip off costs. If you're looking for a new phone system, don't go with a BT Local Business. We'll be nearly doubling the number of phones, getting one or two extras, and still make a reasonable saving over the current lease.

[tech-man]

We use CommsGroup for our Avaya support, they are excellent - Alan’s my contact.

[TTG_Alice]

If you're looking on-premise or cloud private hosted VoIP phone system, drop us a message. We're a big advocate for 3CX

[mavhc]

FreePBX distro installed on server, Grandstream phones, Daisy sip trunks, £7/month with 1000s of free minutes, per simultaneous call. Total cost: £7/month/simultaneous call, about £40/phone, should last 10 years. Dead easy to set up, super flexible, want a new feature, just write some php, or pay someone to do it.

 

Sync VM to cloud if you want to, then just redirect dns if something fails

[supportman]

If you're looking on-premise or cloud private hosted VoIP phone system, drop us a message. We're a big advocate for 3CX

 

Just out of interest how do the cloud versions work? i'm fed up of local servers so this is something we may look at in the future but it has to be cloud based.

[TechMonkey]

Just out of interest how do the cloud versions work? i'm fed up of local servers so this is something we may look at in the future but it has to be cloud based.

 

Same as if it was onsite, you use a URL to connect to it, the URL just resolves to an offsite IP. 3CX has a web interface that we have given an FQDN to with our external domain, so if it were to be moved we can just repoint the subdomain to an external IP. All the phones just reference that URL. If I remember rightly the phones use a DHCP pointer to get provisioned, so you would have to port that to whatever system you would use, but that shouldn't be tricky.

 

We are seriously considering it, the only issue is cost vs on site. Ignoring server cost and ongoing power and cooling it would take about 2 years before cloud costs superseded onsite from the quotes we had.

[Simcfc73]

FreePBX distro installed on server, Grandstream phones, Daisy sip trunks, £7/month with 1000s of free minutes, per simultaneous call. Total cost: £7/month/simultaneous call, about £40/phone, should last 10 years. Dead easy to set up, super flexible, want a new feature, just write some php, or pay someone to do it.

 

Sync VM to cloud if you want to, then just redirect dns if something fails

 

I've been watching a few videos on this and might go down this route. The NEC gear we have needs an upgrade which is £4k which is way more than moving to new Grandstream phones. We've got around 45 extensions with 20 DDI's which we will need to evaluate.

 

Do you have the Grandstream ones on the main reception and office?

[mavhc]

I've been watching a few videos on this and might go down this route. The NEC gear we have needs an upgrade which is £4k which is way more than moving to new Grandstream phones. We've got around 45 extensions with 20 DDI's which we will need to evaluate.

 

Do you have the Grandstream ones on the main reception and office?

 

Yeah, you can get one you can extend with the extra buttons Extension Modules | Grandstream Networks

[keyboards]

We use 3CX

[leeshellard]

Thanks everyone we ended up going 3cx and do not regret it

[Simcfc73]

I've installed a FreePBX system, bought the hardware and got all the phones off Ebay.

 

Combination of GXP1450, 2100s and the 2160s on reception. Love the software, the Grandstream don't have all the features of the Sangoma ones to manage but they were £20 each so I can't complain.

[supportman]

Are people just putting these devices on a normal network, or are they using VLANs? Is a VLAN needed in this case?