Telephone Systems Essay, Research Paper
Telephone communication tools have changed dramatically over the past several years. Today many features have been added to telephones. These advanced features have made company’s more efficient in the business environment. Businesses prefer using telephone systems such as Private Branch Exchanges (PBX) to accommodate their business needs.
Call forwarding, voicemail, call transferring, conference calling, and call accounting have become very important features to businesses. Call forwarding allows the user to direct all calls to another extention. It provides another answering location for calls that are not answered within a specific time period, or if the line is found busy. Forwarding is done by dialing a special code followed by the extention number where the calls are to be forwarded. Voice mail is based on telephone access through which you can send and receive spoken messages anytime, anywhere. You can receive you voice messages from a touch-tone telephone, at your office, at home, and in your car. The major advantage of voicemail is that it can put an end to frustrating situations where two people who are often away from their desks repeadiately miss each others calls. Call accounting is a feature that outputs detailed information about each and every call. A call accounting application collects this information and allows you to generate reports on it. Call accounting has been looked at as a cost recovery system but with recent advances in features and functionality call accounting has become an important management tool. Every company that has telemarketing, telesales, service, support, or other phone oriented departments can now have easy fast and affordable access to the valuable information. If businesses are concerned about telecommunication costs or if the company has phone intensive departments then this feature is very useful and businesses should consider using call accounting. Conference calling involves three or more people. Each person can be at a different location but can still communicate with the rest of the party. If your phone has the feature you can add extentions or outside lines to the call. If you do not have this feature you can also set up the call with your local phone company. Be sure to arrange the call ahead of time with the participants and then the operator can set up the call for you. This is a very useful in businesses for meetings. If a person can?t attend a meeting in person he can still be there on the phone. All of these features are very valuable tools for businesses.
Businesses today need to use telephone systems in their offices to have a wider range of services offered to them. A Private Branch Exchange (PBX) is a telephone system that is widely used by businesses. A PBX is a telephone system within a business that switches calls between business users on local lines while allowing all users to share a certain number of external phone lines. The PBX in a company is controlled by a switchboard that controls the central switching station. For example, I work for a company called Grimsby Custom Tooling where I am the secretary the phone system that we have there is actually a mini-PBX system there where I am in control of the main switchboard where I have to route all incoming calls. A mini-PBX is suitable for business that require only a few lines. In this system each line comes in from the phone company on a separate circuit. By punching one or another of the lines buttons on your phone, a dial tone is immediately available to you from the telephone company?s central office. I can do many things with the switchboard. I can transfer calls to specific telephones, also I can see exactly who is on the phone and how long they are on it, and I am in control of four separate telephone lines. Knowing about your telephone system is very important because if anything goes wrong you will have to get into the main system and try to solve it. Today, PBX?s use digital technology for outside calls on the local loop using plain telephone service.