IP Telephony

The maturity of IP telephony means that hotels and resorts of all sizes and with any type of PBX in place can harness the savings this new technology offers. Certainly a new build property is well placed to deploy an IP based PBX however hotels with legacy PBX's can also take advantage of the technology with the simple low risk installation of a Gateway device. 

Typically, the Internet is used to deliver calls from the property to a switching center where the service provider interconnects with multiple global telecoms carriers. By virtue of their volume purchasing capability this new breed of service provider buys minutes from the carriers very cheaply and can pass on large savings to their customers. In fact, most large telecoms carriers can offer this technology too but it is not in their interest to do so!

Saving money on minutes is only part of the benefit, reducing the number of T1 trunk channels into the property is the other major saving. In the case of purchasing a Gateway to work with a legacy PBX then the savings on trunk line rental generally covers the Gateway purchase in about three months. With this in mind it is easy to see why the traditional telecoms carriers like to keep the Internet and telephone service separate, yet curiously they are heavily pushing converged services to the residential market!

It is also possible to have incoming calls routed over the Internet whilst retaining your existing main hotel number and this further reduces the trunk line requirement. However, it is wise to retain some trunk capability as a failover mechanism in case of an Internet failure.

Migrating to IP telephony is not as complicated as some would have you believe, but it is best done with the assistance of a trusted advisor who understands the market. The necessary Internet bandwidth must be properly sized and managed. The service provider needs to be assessed for stability and longevity.

DXI has been managing delivery of IP telephony services for many years for both mainland hotels and island paradise resorts. Indeed, we have a resort on a Caribbean island with five years reliable IP telephony operation and that is testament to how robust the technology can be when properly implemented.