Small business phone system ?

Edwards Finance > Phones

Q. My brother is about to purchase a new phone system for his veterinary practice and has a few bids on NEC IPK Basic systems w & w/o voice mail. The questions we are having is whether or not we could install a system ourselves, and which of the systems we've looked at would provide adequate service for this smallish practice.

A. I'm fairly well versed at installations of anything technical (LANetworked computers, regular phone lines, electrical systems, etc.) as I've been mechanical all my life. I've looked at his existing phone system and I know I could have installed that, with an instruction booklet. As a matter of fact, the wiring for that system is done quite haphazardly above the suspended ceiling. anyway, I've found the Toshiba DK40i system online that seems to have adequate capacity, but all this talk about VoIP and endless options has me a bit confused when looking through his NEC literature and trying to compare it to what we could purchase online. Basically, he now has a 4-line (InterTek) rotating system with 6 phones (including the main reception phone), plus one dedicated line for fax and another for credit card purchases. He's wanting to have some small amount of flexibility to add phone lines & phones (we just added a new office remodel with 4 office stations). He's expecting to have 8 phone lines and probably 16 phones, which is exactly what the Toshiba system offers (DK40 10x16). The Toshiba system with (4 hour) Voice Mail, 16 phones {1]20-button 2020SD, [4]10-button 2010SD & [11]10-button 2010H} including the service unit base and all the cards and a 24-month warranty is about $2400 online. His NEC bids range from $3200 to $4200 (w/o & w v/m), but all three bids only include 8 phones. So, what I'm basically trying to find out: 1) is there a major difference in quality or scalabity of either of these two types of systems, based on the fact that there probably won't be any more physical expansions in this practice (he might build somewhere else...) 2)is the difference in the number of actual phones delivered substantial enough to knock out the NEC bids. I've come to the conclusion that it is, as long as the actual Toshiba system is a DK40i (the web site says DK40, and I know there are differences...) 3) what am I missing that is obscured by all the acronym mumbo jumbo of options and upgrades?? 4) being an installation contractor of heating systems for 25 years, do you think it possible for a do-it-yourselfer to install and manage one of these types of systems first time out?? I am "relatively" aware of his voice mail needs (about 12-14 employees), auto-attendant features, surge suppression & line conditioning needs, and uninterruptable power supply requirements needed for a new installation. What else haven't I taken into account? He's not on the web (no web site), but is networked and has business internet service (just got it...). He currently has no plan to put up a web page, or do fax-back services, but it'd be nice if he eventually could. I write web pages for our family, so I'm sure I could get a site up in the next year, if he needs one. I would be looking closely at the Panasonic TA824. As the number implies, you can get 8 lines and 24 phones in the system. A 6 line by 16 phone system with 2 ports of Voice Mail and 8 phones would be in that $2400 price range without installation. The Panasonic gives you Caller-ID to each phone port, USB programming, 2-way recording, and the ability to add single line phones with CID delivered to the set. Keep in mind, there are 2 prices for voice mail; one is delivered and the other is installed. Check out ablecomm.com and necnec.com. Same company. They handle both the Panasonic and NEC systems. Give you what you need for self install and answer the phone when you have a question. I've done several Pana KXTD systems from them and recently an NEC 1000. No you don't need the "dealer" software but it does help. For Panasonic there are 3rd party softwares, for the NEC you can get it from the NEC web site.

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