I am not a techie. When I started a small business consulting firm ten years ago, I was determined to keep it lean and mean. One person, one phone, one office for the meetings. I didn’t even really need a computer at the time, but a very wise friend persuaded me to get one. I know, it seems crazy that any business could function without e-mail but I was naive back then. I knew how to help anyone create a successful small business and how to refine their ideas to the home runs they could be, but, ironically, I had no idea on how to run one for the long term. My first great move as owner and operator was bringing in a veteran consultant to be my partner. Lou knew how to keep the machinery of the office moving smoothly, both figuratively and literally. He repaired our copier a thousand times and whenever I locked myself out of the computer, he was there to fix it. A year ago, Lou told me that he was ready to retire. I panicked as I catalogued all of the things he was unofficially responsible for, and all of the decisions that I had left to him that I would now be in charge of. Suddenly, I had to get up to speed on all of the technological needs of the office and my staff of twenty-five. I thought I had everything under control, but wouldn’t you know it, the first day without Lou in the office, my phones stopped working. I dug through the stack of papers for the contact information of our phone guy, and I found it on our phone bill. I called him on my cell phone, and while I waited on hold, I noticed the giant amount of money we were paying every month for all of our phone lines. When our rep finally got on the line I told him two things: first, fix our phones, and then, cut our costs in half. He got the first item dealt with pretty quickly by sending out a technician to repair the vandalized phone box out by the curb, but he said he couldn’t help with the costs. â€It’s just the cost of doing business. I can’t change that,†he said. Well, we’ll see about that. I made a few phone calls and I found the answer I was looking for. I switched my whole office to voice over IP using a Hosted voip PBX and our bills are a third of what they used to be. My call quality is fantastic, I don’t talk to the phone guy anymore, and I couldn’t be happier.
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