Questions on accounts and lines and functionality

[engin411]

Newbie questions here: I want to describe our current setup that is costing our business a fortune each month and then work on educating myself on how to replicate most of what we have now, but in a SIP system with 3CX. I'm looking to save about 75% of our monthly cost by using 3CX, and I can't wait. I've posted a couple other threads similar to this, but on disparate subjects, and I'm still confused about the "how" to get this all done.

Current:
a) 4 copper lines from the street, directly corresponding with 4 line buttons (labeled Line 1, Line 2, etc.) on our phones. All incoming calls ring on all phones; any phone can answer any call, and each phone can access all 4 lines for outbound calling. Are these four lines considered "accounts" in the SIP world? So if I want 6 incoming calls to act as they do now, but in a 3CX system, I need to setup 6 accounts on each phone? I have a ring group for all phones setup in 3CX, but I can't figure out how to have all calls ring at all phones (with the exception that if a phone is already in use, it shouldn't ring, but rather blink).

Also related to item a, how does 3CX provision phones with 6 accounts? Of course, maybe I'm all wrong in thinking I need to use 6 accounts.

b) after the secretary answers the call, she pushes Hold and then pages the employee who the call is for. She says "Tom line 1 please" because she can see that the incoming call was on Line 1. Tom then walks to the nearest phone and pushes the Line1 button. This works great because our workers are mobile and go all over our warehouse. Is this feature what is called Shared Park? And if so, do I dedicate 6 buttons to SP1, SP2, SP3, etc. so that the secretary can use the first available park slot for the call and can announce the park slot on the page, plus so Tom can easily pick up on whichever park slot he needs to?

c) our phones now have a button for each extension that shows whether or not the extension is in a conversation, and these buttons also work for intercom. So on the button labeled Tom, I can see if Tom's phone is in use, plus I can push the button to intercom his phone. Is this first feature BLF? If so, is there a way in 3CX to combine BLF and intercom on one programmable button?

d) our overhead paging system is powered by Bogen controller and amp. Any suggestions on how to interface this with 3CX? What do the rest of you who have overhead paging with 3CX use for paging controllers? Cyberdata controllers?

Thanks for any reply on this!

 

[cobaltit]

Newbie questions here: I want to describe our current setup that is costing our business a fortune each month and then work on educating myself on how to replicate most of what we have now, but in a SIP system with 3CX. I'm looking to save about 75% of our monthly cost by using 3CX, and I can't wait. I've posted a couple other threads similar to this, but on disparate subjects, and I'm still confused about the "how" to get this all done.

Current:
a) 4 copper lines from the street, directly corresponding with 4 line buttons (labeled Line 1, Line 2, etc.) on our phones. All incoming calls ring on all phones; any phone can answer any call, and each phone can access all 4 lines for outbound calling. Are these four lines considered "accounts" in the SIP world? So if I want 6 incoming calls to act as they do now, but in a 3CX system, I need to setup 6 accounts on each phone? I have a ring group for all phones setup in 3CX, but I can't figure out how to have all calls ring at all phones (with the exception that if a phone is already in use, it shouldn't ring, but rather blink).

You only need one account on each phone. You make all the phones part of the ring group, and you enable the ability to receive multiple calls on each phone and from the ring group (extension and advanced settings respectively). An account can have multiple call appearances per account, up to the maximum call appearances available on the phone. It is confusing as most phones are marketed as capable of X SIP accounts, but really what they mean is they can register to that many difference providers and typically have the physical buttons to map each account to a single button. In your case, you would only need the one account (registered to 3CX) and as many buttons as you would expect the user of that particular phone to handle. So typical installs would be 4-6 line phones at the reception and then 2-3 line phones deployed in the rest of the office.

Also related to item a, how does 3CX provision phones with 6 accounts? Of course, maybe I'm all wrong in thinking I need to use 6 accounts.

3CX provisioning with the standard templates only support one account, which is all that is required for your scenario. However, should you ever need to go beyond that, it involves creating your own custom templates.

b) after the secretary answers the call, she pushes Hold and then pages the employee who the call is for. She says "Tom line 1 please" because she can see that the incoming call was on Line 1. Tom then walks to the nearest phone and pushes the Line1 button. This works great because our workers are mobile and go all over our warehouse. Is this feature what is called Shared Park? And if so, do I dedicate 6 buttons to SP1, SP2, SP3, etc. so that the secretary can use the first available park slot for the call and can announce the park slot on the page, plus so Tom can easily pick up on whichever park slot he needs to?

Shared Park is exactly the feature you would use to transition from your key system to 3CX. You can still use the same Line terminology, or just announce the calls as 'Park 1, Park 2, etc'. If you want the one-touch capability, you will want to stay away from Grandstream and go Yealink to Snom. Grandstream requires a transfer + SP sequence, where as the others will park with just the SP button pressed.

c) our phones now have a button for each extension that shows whether or not the extension is in a conversation, and these buttons also work for intercom. So on the button labeled Tom, I can see if Tom's phone is in use, plus I can push the button to intercom his phone. Is this first feature BLF? If so, is there a way in 3CX to combine BLF and intercom on one programmable button?

BLF yes, intercom maybe. BLF buttons provisioned via 3CX would be a BLF + Speed dial. Intercom implies auto-answer on the speaker of the target, which is not done by default. That being said, customizing your templates can allow that as most phones can be set to auto-answer.

d) our overhead paging system is powered by Bogen controller and amp. Any suggestions on how to interface this with 3CX? What do the rest of you who have overhead paging with 3CX use for paging controllers? Cyberdata controllers?

All you would really be concerned about is the actual interface to the current PBX. If it is simple another extension on the system connected via FXS, then you just need a simple ATA like a Grandstream or Patton. If the current controller is connected via an audio out, then you would want to replace it with one that either has an Ethernet interface and speaks SIP to 3CX or one that accepts an analog telephone line an then an ATA. You can search on the forums for recommended models.

Thanks for any reply on this!

You're welcome, and good luck!