Your telephone is your lifeline. It’s how you communicate with your customers or clients. Without it your business couldn’t continue. It rests on your desk and has worked flawlessly for years. It never gives you any problems. You may not even remember the last time you had to have it serviced. You depended on it. Are these statements true with you and your business?

Consider this: If your system hasn’t kept pace with the latest software, your business lifeline is at risk. The flawlessly working telephone system you count on will fail and you could be left with no communications into or out of your business.

Everything will eventually wear out. Entropy is the natural state of all things including your telephone system. When it does, will your service provider be able to repair it? Will replacement parts be available? Will your service provider be able to obtain manufacturer support for the system? These are questions that all businesses have to ask themselves and the service provider maintaining their system.

Examples of Potential Disasters

Company A has been using telephone system from a major manufacturer for 8 years. Except for some minor moves and changes the system hasn’t had to have any service for almost 2 years. Then one Monday morning, everyone arrives at their desk to find they have no dial tone. A frantic call goes out to the service provider and a technician shows up at your door within the hour. The technician believes he has found the failed component and replaces it. But the system still doesn’t return to service. He places a call to the manufacture for tech support but is told that level of software is no longer supported and he can’t be helped. Now your technician is just guessing as to what to do ore replace next. Meanwhile, more time passes as the business looses money.

Company B has been using their telephone system for 10 years. This system hasn’t so much as had a hiccup since the day it was installed. It’s not one of the Big Four in telephone manufactures (Mitel, Nortel, Avaya, Cisco), but it meets their needs and works well. Then one day a storm passes though, lightning crashes outside, the power blinks out and come back on but the phones never do. The manager digs through her Rolodex for the phone number of the company that installed it only to find it is no longer in business. A quick check on the Internet finds another local vendor for that manufacturer but is told that product has been discontinued for 5 years and they don’t service it. They’d be happy to sell you the latest version but lead-time even for an emergency installation is one week.

These are not unrealistic examples what can happen. As a matter of fact, they are not even uncommon. So does this mean you have to buy the latest technology every year? No. But it does mean you should at least keep up with the latest supported software.

Every manufacture is going to End of Life (EOL) obsolete systems and software eventually. It’s too expensive to try staff and maintain inventories for systems that are no longer being sold. However, often a manufacture will discontinue support only for older software levels but, technically speaking, the hardware is supported. The manufacturer will often support the hardware IF the system is running supported software. The key to providing support is the software level. It ensures your hardware is supported.

Most PBX and Key System manufactures have special programs and incentives to help you keep your software current. Keeping current benefits you in several ways such as:

Guaranteeing Support to your service company should they need it.

Ensuring that replacement hardware is available.

Keeps you in touch with your telephone system vendor so you’ll be more aware of their manufacturer relationship.

Gives you access to the features and benefits of the latest trends and innovations in business telephone services.

Consider the last time you talked to your telephone system vendor about your current software level. If it’s been over a year, you should call your sales rep to have them review your situation. If your current software level is manufactured EOL or is about to be EOL, you should seriously consider upgrading. The risk of not doing so could mean substantial financial losses to your business.