Having benefited from the cost savings of a least-cost routing solution, law firm Webber Wentzel Bowens (WWB) took the plunge and converted its telephony infrastructure to voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) late last year.
Says WWB IT manager Eugene van Vuren: "Legal firms tend be very conservative, but we have a different approach; we like to stay abreast of new technology. We won't necessarily take on a new version of [Microsoft] Windows the day it is launched, but if we feel a service deserves a test, we will jump on the bandwagon."
The company has been an Orion Telecom client for six years. Says Van Vuren: "I approached Orion a few years ago and told them that we would be willing to test drive with them when they got into VOIP. As long as we kept the Premicell in place, I had no worries. If VOIP didn't work, we could fall back."
WWB provides legal advice and assistance to international corporations, financial institutions and government organisations. It has 400 staff in SA, with branches in Johannesburg and Cape Town.
In and out
Switching WWB's infrastructure from its legacy system to VOIP was a simple process. Says Orion Telecom sales manager Steve Macfie: "As part of the process, we left the on-site GSM installation in place in case the VOIP trial didn't go according to plan. We only cut the cellular components to VOIP for the purposes of the trial, with the intention of converting national and international calls to VOIP at a later stage."
After a lengthy trial process, WWB declared it was satisfied with the VOIP solution. The company signed a renewal agreement for the cellular/VOIP installation, as well as an agreement to convert its national and international traffic to VOIP.
Orion has swapped out the on-site equipment, says Macfie. "We had a series of analogue GSM modems on site that we have replaced with digital equipment. We're not doing straight IP or Ethernet, so we've installed a gateway device that blankets the Telkom lines. A router on the back-end connects the Diginet line to the VPN. It is quite literally a complete swap out of the technologies used to terminate traffic.
"We're waiting for additional bandwidth before we convert the international dialling from call-back to VOIP dial," he notes. "At the same time, we've started capturing national traffic that's terminating off-site - excluding WWB's inter-branch traffic. [WWB] has its own MPLS-enabled VPN between Johannesburg and Cape Town, so internal traffic goes over that first, followed by our network and then via Telkom as a third choice for that traffic."
GSM termination
If a service deserves a test, we will jump on the bandwagon.
Eugene van Vuren, IT manager, Webber Wentzel Bowens
With the VOIP network in place, calls are routed via VOIP to Orion's central hosting environment, at which point the calls are terminated onto the GSM network. Of the calls going out over WWB's telecoms system, 59% are cellular, 20% local, 11% national and 10% international.
The company's employees made nearly 10 265 hours of cellular phone calls in the past year.
Says WWB's Van Vuren: "We're seeing significant saving in terms of costs. We're on a managed services solution from Orion, so the savings are guaranteed. Our monthly telephone bill with standard costs is fairly scary, so we are very happy with the savings."
Completely seamless
The move has also been transparent to WWB's user base, he says. As a whole, Van Vuren is pleased with the VOIP service and more than delighted with the service he receives from Orion.
"In SA, everyone complains about the lack of service. Orion is one of the few companies that is proactive. When something goes wrong, the technicians are on site before we are even aware that there is a problem. That is extremely rare in the IT environment.
"WWB has been with Orion for several years now and we would not consider changing service providers as we don't believe other companies out there are offering a comparable service."
Working solutions and good after-sales service result in happy customer. Other local providers can only benefit from bearing this simple equation in mind in the future.
Share