Tec, Fire And Security – Telecoms Placed In Safe Hands

With an office move providing an opportunity for further expansion, the directors at TEC Fire and Security knew that the firm’s telephone system would have to be updated to make room for increased growth.

Until the fire safety and security firm moved to new premises in Marston Moretaine at the end of last year, they had been managing with one fixed landline. Handling calls could be difficult when the line was tied up – not helped by having engineers out in the field during the day and needing to be on call out of office hours.

ACS were called in to provide a solution that would break down what could have been a barrier to growth, and drew up plans for a new 8×8 system that would allow for multiple users and easier call management.

Managing Director of TEC Fire and Security, Simon Philp, said: “It had become virtually unworkable, having just one landline. We didn’t want to push on and advertise the business because we weren’t confident we would be able to cope with extra calls coming in.

“We moved our offices to Marston Moretaine last year, which puts us in a better location to grow our market in Milton Keynes and Northamptonshire, as well as Bedfordshire, and that seemed like the ideal time to call in ACS and see what we could do.

“As well as taking  a higher volume of incoming calls, we also needed a system where we could manage the redirection of emergency calls to the engineer that was on duty. Before, we had to go into the office and manually put the phones on redirect, which was a pain if someone was sick or if the person on call changed during a long weekend, for example.”

David Szreider, Unified Communications and Telecoms Sales Manager at ACS, met with Simon and the team to discuss their needs and complete a connectivity check before suggesting the 8×8 system.

Simon was impressed with the demonstration, which included desk phones and soft phone applications, so that the administration team could work from any location without having to give out their personal mobile numbers.

A call queue was set up on a mobile app so that the engineers can log in and out of the queue when it’s their turn to be on call, while the management team can manage the redirection service should the rota change, someone forgets to switch redirection on, or to get round any change in working arrangements.

David said: “It’s not a complicated system and we brought everyone up to speed on a train the trainer basis, so there was someone within the company that could make sure everyone else knew how everything worked.

“After the deployment and training, TEC now have access to the telecoms support team, who can help them deal with an issues that arise.”

Switching to the new system opened up new opportunities for TEC Fire and Security in a cost-effective manner, and with the understanding that the 8×8 system can easily expand to allow further growth down the line.

Simon Philp added: “It’s been a great solution for us, it makes life a whole lot easier and we’re more efficient. But the most important thing is that when you work out the costings, it’s not actually any more expensive to have this system than the one we had before.”