Source: www.voip-news.com

CTI Group and CommPartners Connect have partnered to offer VoIP call recording for small and medium-sized businesses called SmartRecord IP.

“SmartRecord IP is a shining example of how IP communications can deliver feature-rich, fully integrated, and value-added services to the SMB market that are unmatched by the traditional phone company,” says Mark Peterson, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for CommPartners Connect. “Our resellers are proving each day that not only does the value proposition of VoIP sell services, but applications like SmartRecord IP have great appeal to important segments of the SMB market and increase overall demand for VoIP. By responding to the demand for these value-added features and applications, we are enabling our resellers to meet customer needs and win more deals while driving growth of their VoIP business portfolio.”

According to the company:

SmartRecord IP is a hosted VoIP call recording application. With geographic redundancy and infinite scalability, it offers network operators, like CommPartners Connect, the ability to offer call recording directly from the switch, rather than as an afterthought. This integration with the CommPartners Connect BroadSoft applications platform allows SmartRecord IP to be more failsafe and secure than other add-on call recording solutions. SmartRecord IP also makes all recordings available on the internet through the use of a point-and-click web-interface, requiring very little training or support to implement this system into daily business processes.

“By partnering with industry leaders like CommPartners Connect, we believe we are providing our solution, SmartRecord IP, with the very best backbone possible to reach the VoIP market. Our hope is to make the solutions that have previously only been available to the biggest companies available to every company. The benefit that tools like SmartRecord IP can have to smaller businesses is astronomical and gives those smaller companies the ability to be competitive with their larger competitors. CTI Group hopes to level the playing field by offering all businesses equal access to monitoring and management tools like SmartRecord IP,” says Sid Rao, Chief Technology Officer, CTI Group, Inc.

Source: www.voip-news.com

SAI will be showcasing their Sierra Gold VIP Call Accounting software at Cisco Live 2009 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco from June 27-July 2. The conference is for IT and communications professionals.

“We are very pleased to be exhibiting at Cisco Live 2009, which is known for bringing together technology innovators like SAI with enterprises looking for innovative solutions to safeguard and streamline their telecom operations,” said Debra Basaldua, Director of Marketing for SAI. “The ability to deliver the right information to the right people at the right time makes Call Accounting even more relevant in today’s troubled economy.”

According to SAI:

During the event, SAI will showcase its Sierra Gold VoIP Call Accounting software that offers integrated solutions for Cisco products. Sierra Gold enables enterprises to collect and report on key telecom metrics to enhance VoIP network configuration, establish and enforce corporate security and compliance standards, and align IT and telecom operations with business needs.

Source: www.voip-news.com

Cheaper calls to Mexico? Yep. Pingo and Pingo Business have reduced their calling rates to Mexico by 50 percent for consumers and SMBs. The prepaid VoIP calling service offered by iBasis is offering the discount in order to facilitate communication with the country that is facing massive shutdowns thanks to the recent H1N1 influenza outbreak.

According to iBasis:

iBasis, a leading carrier of international long distance telephone calls and operator of Pingo, carries a large volume of phone calls from the U.S. to Mexico. To help its customers stay in touch with family, friends and business associates during this difficult time, Pingo has reduced all calling rates to Mexico by 50% through May 31, 2009.

Who: Pingo can be accessed in 35 countries and allows consumers to purchase low-cost calling minutes from a wholesaler on an as-needed basis with no hidden fees, surcharges or further contractual obligation. Customers can use fixed or mobile phones; no additional equipment purchases or software downloads are necessary (Internet-connected PCs can utilize Pingo’s SoftPhone feature). Pingo Business provides SMBs with service for up to 999 employees, accompanied by easy and powerful online management capabilities. Pingo is provided by iBasis, one of the top three carriers of international phone calls in the world, and operator of the most extensive international VoIP network. This relationship enables Pingo to deliver very low international calling rates and consistent, high-quality service.

Source: www.voip-news.com

Call centers are important to businesses of all sizes. They instill a sense of confidence in customers, since someone from the company is available to answer questions at reasonable times. But the cost of creating a call center used to be prohibitive to smaller companies.

That’s not the case anymore.

IP Telephony, and specifically VoIP, has allowed companies to create and implement call centers like large companies have without the high costs of running it. Not only can the equipment be much less than that of traditional call centers, but workers can even work from remote locations — lessening the expenses for physical space needed.

In fact, even AT&T offers VoIP call center technology now …

Source: www.voip-news.com

Wi-Fi Planet reports that the iPhone is getting some much-needed updates to improve VoIP service.

The other VoIP News reports that Tesco has launched VoIP service over there. And it’s pretty darn inexpensive.

Zahir’s Blog has the scoop on the lowest long distance rates . . . and they aren’t coming from traditional phone service.

Source: www.voip-news.com

For those who might need to record a VoIP call, there is a new service from CallCopy. CallCopy Essential is a new VoIP call recording solution that can capture and archive both incoming and outgoing calls. It’s intended for use by small businesses to better customer service and increase productivity.

The CallCopy Essential base package includes online storage for more than 34,000 hours of audio, licensing for five concurrent recording channels, remote installation, Web-based training and online support. Essential is powered by a 1U Dell Server. For more information on CallCopy’s call recording solutions, visit www.callcopy.com or call 888-922-5526.

Source: www.voip-news.com

Mac and Linux users can now make computer to phone VoIP calls with Raketu’s RakOut WebPhone. The program is in beta. The service doesn’t require any downloading.

To try the service, go to http://www.raketu.com/rakoutweb.html.

Source: www.voip-news.com

This is all a little spy-movie-esk for me.

Have you ever had a fuzzy VoIP call? Well, it might not be just a bad connection. It could be someone intercepting your call and inserting secret messages into the packet. No, not kidding.

According to New Science Tech:

Wojciech Mazurczyk and Krzysztof Szczypiorski, information scientists at the Institute of Telecommunications in Warsaw, Poland, revealed last week that they are developing a “steganographic” system for VoIP networks (www.arxiv.org/abs/0805.2938). Steganography is the art of hiding messages by embedding them in ordinary communications.

A little freaky, no?

Via Slashdot.

Source: www.voip-news.com

Switching to a VoIP call center might be convenient, but you need to make sure you maintain quality control. Having polite, friendly call center reps is important, but so is having the right resources and tracking performance.

According to VoIP News:

Most companies simply don’t have the on-site manpower, expertise and technical resources to keep constant tabs on the ongoing performance of their agents and network. In fact, a recent study by The Taylor Reach Group reported that 60 percent of organizations surveyed said that in the past six months, they experienced at least one month where they failed to meet the standard number of monitors required by their organization.

For a good resource on maintaining quality control at your VoIP call center, check out this article on VoIP News.

Source: voipcentral.org

US-based SunRocket has agreed to make use of DigiLinea Latin American VoIP Network to offer enriched and low cost direct call termination to different regions in Latin America.

DigiLinea is regarded as one of leading VoIP infrastructure and service providers to the US Hispanic and Latin American Markets. Its VoIP network in Latin America ensures proper routs for VoIP call termination to different service providers.

SunRocket always aims at providing customized VoIP services to the customers and reduce termination costs on calls to Latin America. The adoption of DigiLinea Network will not only help the VoIP giant to achieve in its mission to offer customized offerings but also increase revenue and profit per line.

In a statement to the press, DigiLinea CEO and Chairman, Gregory Keough said,

Internet phone service providers recognize that Latinos spend more per month on telecom services then other demographic groups due to their high volume of calling to and from Latin America. We are pleased SunRocket has chosen our next generation platform for call termination to the Latin America market.

Ensuring crystal clear VoIP calls to the customers determines effectiveness of a VoIP service. In this context, SunRockets association with DigiLinea assumes greater significance.

Source: voipcentral.org

One of the greatest disadvantages of VoIP is call failure that disturbs entire communication process. Nearly 3.1 percent of all VoIP calls fail to reach their destination. The rate is merely 0.01 percent in case of traditional telephone services, Business Week Magazine claims.

Taking a remarkable step to ensure cent percent VoIP call completion, Eyeball has developed a software module, AnyFirewall Engine that would work on Smartphones ensuring 100 percent call completions anywhere in the world.

To a large extent, the increasing use of Internet has caused a phenomenal shortage of Internet real estate or IP addresses. To overcome this problem, the service providers often use NAT (Network Address Translation) to conceal many private addresses in a single public address, which hampers VoIP calls.

Chirs Piche, CEO of Eyeball acknowledges,

Until now, firewall and NAT traversal has been the biggest obstacle to VoIP adoption.Eyeball has pioneered VoIP call completion since 2001 and we are delighted to make our innovation available to industry partners worldwide through the release of AnyFirewall Engine.

As of now, Eyeball has reached out an agreement with Smartphone giant Nokia to provide its AnyFirewall technology .It means Nokia users can expect perfect VoIP calls while using Smartphones.

Source: voipcentral.org

In the month of July this year, Brix Networks has reported that nearly 20 percent of all VoIP calls had unacceptable quality. Following the report, the companies are developing new technologies to eradicate the age-old VoIP problem.

According to this source, Canadian VoIP outfit Nortel Networks has come up with a managed VoIP service system that monitors IP telephony networks 24 hours for enriched voice quality and network operation.

Called as Managed VoIP Service with Proactive Voice Quality Management, the newest system facilitates real-time monitoring of voice quality from network to handsets and detects traverse of unwanted traffics in a network.

The Nortel Monitoring System troubleshoots when call quality falls below the standard via techniques like trace routes. It provides solutions to ease the problem.

It is now available at Nortels North America Network Management Center in Raleigh, New York.