VoIP Quality of Service (QOS) for small business, where is it?

Is your VoIP quality the pits?

VoIP and SIP Trunking over best efforts Internet can cause SMBs to jump off the VoIP bandwagon rather quickly.  Most small phone systems today do not have any built-in QOS (Quality of Service) monitoring, and those that do are likely not doing anything more than the typical MOS (Mean Opinion Score) based on historical packets.

MOS results are great when we are trying to see what the results were after the problem was detected and can certainly help with understanding some trends, but it does not do much to help SMBs understand why the QOS they are receiving from their current provider is sub par.

The truth of the matter is, the quality of service the ITSP (Internet Telephony Service Provider) is delivering can be high but there are factors that degrade that quality between the SMB’s LAN and the ITSP’s switch(s).

What can be done about it? Depending on your budget and technical acumen, something can be done or nothing can be done.

Most ITSPs who provide SIP Trunks or Hosted VoIP for business will not provide much more than a service status. Either the service status is “Active” or “Inactive”. This is not because they are intentionally holding back, they simply do not have the tools to be able to deliver more information to their users without breaking the bank. VoIP network tools are expensive and are generally not all that easily extensible.

There are some QOS monitoring tools that are fairly cheap and easily accessible. Some are even free!

VoIP Spear (free and paid) is a great little service created by Henry Fernandes at Toepoke Software. VoIP Spear uses ICMP packets (ping packets) to monitor remote connections. We have been using the service for a couple of months now and have made good use of the historical MOS data that the service provides. The only downfall is that uses ICMP. Most routers these days have ICMP echo turned off by default, mostly due to security concerns and potential inaccuracies. That being said it’s a great tool for acquiring remote MOS data and Henry tells me they are working on an API.

But what about ongoing call testing? Some say the only real way to determine QOS is to run periodic call tests that can report on call quality, connectivity issues, bandwidth, latency, delay, jitter etc. Again, tools exist but are expensive and are generally made to run at the top level of the network for network engineers, not SMB owners. Some router/switch vendors like Adtran do have some devices that will deliver on some MOS scoring and alerting but they again are not cheap, generally they start at $1200 (US) for the basics, which puts it out of range for many Canadian SMBs.

This begs the question, “SMBs should not have to concern themselves with QOS, their service should just work, right?”

Yes, it should just work, much like the legacy telephone networks have for the last hundred years. Why should the business owner be forced to accept dropped calls, broken conversations, 1-way audio, and the like, just because it’s VoIP.

The truth is, they won’t switch if they think the lines might drop or the quality might be sub par. Which might explain why so few SMBs have made the jump to VoIP-based systems and service in North America.

What can be done to increase adoption of VoIP for SMBs in Canada? The first remedy is fairly straightforward, ISPs need to increase broadband to small businesses and provide some application prioritization without dramatically increasing price. Considering ISPs want to deliver their own digital voice/VoIP offers, this might be a ways off.

What about better tools, integrated into the PBXs?

One could integrate some of the QOS monitoring/testing bits directly into the phone systems that are sold and by using open standards, provide a secure interface so the Internet Telephony Service Providers would be able to show QOS to their users via their user portals and the like. This would obviously require the pbx vendor to integrate the client piece and the ITSP would presumably host the web components.

This will allow VoIP service providers to show QOS data and provide controls around that for their own customers. Call testing details could be provided in real-time without spending tens of thousands to extend their current toolset to their users in a manner they will understand. This proactive self-support approach would also reduce inbound support for the service provider and would presumably help sell more PBXs for the vendor.

Vancouver Small Business Server User Group - Response Point

Join Erik Lagerway and Trent Johnsen, co-founder/executives of SMB Phone to see how Microsoft Response Point is changing small business communications and what it means for you and your customers.

SMB Phone is a national Response Point distributor and Canada’s newest Microsoft certified Internet Telephony Service Provider (ITSP) and the only provider to be integrated with Response Point in Canada. Along with a working demo/overview of Response Point, SMB Phone will provide an insider’s industry perspective on Microsoft Response Point and the latest software release, Service Pack 2, and how you can improve your customer’s business communications and enjoy significant new business opportunities working with Microsoft Response Point and SMB Phone.

SMB Digital Voice integrated with Microsoft Response Point

A slide from John Frederiksen's (standing room only) keynote at ITexpo '09 Miami making reference to the new relationship with SMB Phone in Canada.

Every Microsoft Response Point system sold today is now bundled with the SMB Digital Voice service. Through the Response Point Administrator one can add SMB Phone service to their Response Point system in under 5 minutes.

VOIP || Hosted UC

With all the hype about Unified Communications and its productivity benefits, it is imperative we remind end users of the tremendous integration challenges they are bound to face when looking to integrate a large set of disparate applications. While vendors claim they have ensured interoperability with various partners and competitors, the market is still so nascent that the hassles may very well exceed the benefits for many businesses seeking to deploy a complete unified communications solution (IM/chat+telephony+VM/UM+conferencing, etc.).

Therefore a hosted UC service seems to offer a major benefit - a service provider has already dealt with all integration challenges and can deliver a package of applications that it also continues to manage, upgrade and enhance as the technologies evolve. Add to this the flexibility of a hosted offering (the ability to drop or add users as the business downsizes or grows) and a hosted UC solution seems perfect for the current economic climate.

It is not so simple, however. In a scenario where all applications are hosted, the assumption is that the customer has no or limited premise-based infrastructure. Otherwise, the service provider and the business face the same old interoperability/integration challenge. That holds particularly true if the IM/chat/UC platform is hosted. Most UC platforms (MCS, OCS, Sametime, etc.) do not scale to multiple premise-based PBXs. Which basically makes hosted UC highly correlated with customer demand for hosted telephony.

So far, the North American hosted IP telephony service market has experienced slow growth due to multiple factors including greater customer familiarity with premise-based platforms and a large installed PBX base, fragmented competitive landscape with limited involvement of established service providers, and lack of aggressive marketing resulting in low awareness of the value of hosted IP telephony. Frost & Sullivan estimates less than one million installed hosted IP telephony lines as of the end of 2008, which is fairly insignificant compared to a total of over 100 million business telephony lines (hosted and PBX) in North America.

Over the past couple of years, equipment vendors made significant efforts to enable the integration of their premise-based platforms with other communication and business applications in complex unified communications (UC) and communication-enabled business process (CEBP) environments. These technology advancements and the respective marketing efforts have greatly popularized the benefits of premise-based IP telephony and have driven high adoption rates. Hosted IP telephony providers, on the other hand, continue to market their services primarily as cost-effective voice communications, which has limited their value proposition for business customers. Therefore, hosted IP telephony penetration remains limited to small businesses of less than 50 users.

Going forward, hosted IP telephony services will continue to offer a somewhat limited value proposition until integration with hosted or premise-based communication and business applications becomes more common across providers. In the meantime, premise-based IP telephony offerings will make a significant progress in terms of features, integration with UC platforms, CEBP, and cost-efficient branch-office integration. Combined with customers’ historical preference for premise-based solutions and familiarity with PBX vendors and their VARs, as well as with vendor and VAR creative leasing and financing programs, this trend is likely to determine a general preference for IP PBXs versus hosted IP telephony among business customers (the few that may choose to make an investment in this climate).

Response Point Rapid Turn Around

Yesterday the RP team addressed some concerns over loosing “barge-in” in the latest Service Pack and added that feature back in for a new build, now available. Yep, you heard right. This is not a patch, it’s a new build. If you know anything about the development of commercial software you would certainly agree that a 2 week turnaround (from SP 2 launch in Miami) on a new build is pretty damn impressive.

iPhone Skype app bringing VoIP issues to the limelight

Network carriers are reacting predictably negative to the release of Skype on Apple's iPhone,mocoNews is reporting.

Last week, AT&T public policy executive told USA Today that the company has "every right" to not promote the services of its wireless rival, and has done so by disabling Skype access to the 3G network; the application can only be used on WiFi networks. "We absolutely expect our vendors not to facilitate the services of our competitors. Skype is a competitor, just like Verizon, or Sprint, or T-Mobile," he said.

And now, according to mocoNews, two advocacy groups are pressing regulators to support VoIP. The Free Press is asking the FCC to protect wireless net neutrality in favor of Skype, and in Europe, Voice on the Net (VON) has asked policy-makers to ensure the rights of access to applications such as Skype.

VOIP in Business

Benefits of VoIP

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Many people have heard of VoIP or Voice Over Internet Protocol, but not many know about the benefits of VoIP. In short, VoIP is a technology that transmits audio files as data over the Internet to another computer or a VoIP phone or a standard landline telephone, depending on what you use. As it uses the Internet as the medium, call charges can be minimised.

By not knowing these benefits, people are not aware of the advantages that VoIP has to offer and hence are not making the switch as they should. Below is a list of some of the benefits of VoIP:

Cheaper Calls

Who would not jump at the opportunity of reducing their local and especially long distance calls? Different service providers would offer different packages. Some might offer free unlimited long distance calls, while some might offer calls for a small fee.

Whether it is for your business or residential use, VoIP is undoubtedly cheaper than the standard landline telephones. Families can talk to each other longer, and businesses can increase their productivity.

Additional Features At No Charge

Features that are normally offered for a fee are often free of charge with VoIP services. Features such as Voicemail, Caller ID, Call Forwarding, Call Waiting, Call Transfer, etc. are offered at no additional cost with VoIP. For business purposes, features such as email and web utilities, just to name a few, are also offered free of charge. Long gone are the days where you have to pay for these extras.

Choosing Own Area Code

Another great benefit of VoIP is the ability to choose your own phone numbers and area codes. This means that, should you want to maintain your existing number, you can always transfer your number to the new VoIP service or you may decide to choose a new one based on the area code.

The latter is beneficial if you have family members and friends who are staying in a different area code from you. All you have to do is to change your number to the same area code as theirs. This way, whenever they call you, they will be charged for local calls. They will thank you for this additional savings on their phone bills.

Great For Business

Business owners are now switching to VoIP as we speak. With all the features and benefits discussed above, they can reduce their business costs and phone bills, hence increasing their productivity. With VoIP, employees are able to stay in touch with their employers, colleagues and especially their customers.

This further saves a lot of money if you have mobile employees who travel extensively like sales people in your business. They can stay connected at all times and never again miss an important call. All they have to do is to plug in and accept the calls no matter where they are in the world.

On top of that, VoIP is a blessing if you have a call center for your business. This way, you are able to outsource your work inexpensively to agents in the countries that your business operates in.

Now that you are aware of the many benefits of VoIP, as well as the flexibility and freedom that VoIP offers, you know that they are far more advantageous compared to the standard landline telephones.

Unfortunately, many people will keep on paying the high monthly phone bills when they could have easily made the switch to VoIP and save on their next month?s charges with a single decision.