Hosted PBX Guide

            The business phone PBX market is one of the fastest changing markets, with significant technology changes occurring on a weekly basis.  As such, it's both easy to miss the important details, and hard to figure out what the difference between some of the services available are.  Here, I'll be working to get you through the difference between business phone PBX types.  Even though the site is dedicated to hosted PBX, this part will give you a little more information on why.

            When you're in the market for a PBX, you have three basic choices: hardware PBX, hosted PBX, or do-it-yourself PBX.  A friend of mine used the term ‘buy, build or host', and that's an excellent description, as well as the order I will be approaching the options in.  If you don't already know what a PBX is, I advise reading the PBX 101 first.

            Buying a PBX System

            Purchasing a business phone PBX system from vendors like Nortel, Avaya, or Siemens still makes sense for a large company.  If you're looking at hundreds of employees or more in large office buildings or call centers, a premise-based PBX might be most cost effective choice.  The most common downsides to a hardware PBX are initial cost and on-site technical management, but companies of that size usually can handle starting expenses and already have a technical support group on site.  And if there's a lot of inter-office communication between employees, having your own PBX system significantly cuts down the costs when compare to standard telephone communication.

            Building a PBX System

            In terms of building a system, software like Asterisk can be loaded onto a Linux switch and combined with purchased telephony hardware to function as a homebrew PBX.  Sign up with a carrier to deliver IP backhauled calls, install IP phones at all the desks, do some light programming inside the Asterisk software, and you'll have your own basic PBX system.  If all of that sounds like it would be simple to do, then a built system might be the right choice.  More preconfigured systems like Fonality are also becoming available to reduce the technical expertise required.  The disadvantage, however, is still that a fair amount of technical skill is required to get your built system up and running, and even more is required to get all the features provided by other business phone PBX services.

            Getting a Hosted PBX System

            Hosted PBX systems provide all the advantages of a hardware PBX but without the requirement for a hardware closet, installation, or maintenance.  Since you're having the service provided you get to skip the costs of buying the hardware, which can get pretty exorbitant for a small company.  The setup is quick and easy, and you don't lose any of the features provided to the big companies, which can make a smaller company look larger than it is.

            In Closing

            If you have hundreds of employees in centralized locations, the starting expense and technical/spatial requirements of having your own hardware is eventually beaten by the lower costs and higher amount of control you have over the system.  If your business is full of technical wizards, a built system gives complete control over your phone system at a good price without a significant reduction in features.  For everyone else, the best choice is probably a hosted PBX.  Keep in mind that this advice is not definitive, though - just keep it in mind as you're examining your options.

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