For the last few years there have been vast amounts of promotion in the way of improving speeds of internet connections, and where possible, upgrading connections to Fibre and Leased Lines. The issue with this is that Fibre is not available everywhere (using Leeds as an example there are many LS1 postcodes that can’t get a Fibre Connection), and Leased Lines can be hundreds of pounds a month which makes them inaccessible for many smaller businesses. In addition, Fibre does not have any sort of a guaranteed upload speed and so whilst the download speed may be impressive, upload speed whilst usually better, may not always be so.
Therefore we go back to Broadband, and for many companies it is a case of simply having to put up with a poor connection. The main problems are:1) The poor upload speeds, due to ADSL being an Asymmetric connection with priority being given to downloads on the limited bandwidth.2) The loss of service with no service level agreements.For our business being primarily voice based, these are two major problems, and something that makes recommending Voice over IP difficult when only broadband is available.However as with most problems that arise there are solutions!1) There is a product available called ‘Annex M’ which can be added to our broadband connections. Annex M stabilises the broadband connection by reducing the download speed slightly, and in doing so it also raises the upload speeds. With this, it allows for guaranteed upload speeds of up to 2.5Mb/s; the UK average is approximately 1.8Mb/s, however this is not guaranteed and will suffer in peak times.For Voice over IP 2.5Mb/s will allow for multiple concurrent calls, and the guaranteed upload speeds will allow for stability which may not be experienced with standard broadband.2) For a small additional monthly charge, there is an agreement in place so that a fix will take place within 20 hours of a fault being reported.This then means that whilst hopefully it won’t ever be required, if a problem does arise it should be solved very quickly. The above two solutions both mean that running voice across a broadband connection is stable, and so it opens up a whole new range of avenues for communications. In addition for a company using the connection purely for data, the improved stability and reliability is something which is of major benefit on a business level.
For further information on internet connectivity & the various options available, please feel free to contact us on 0113 2059640 or email us at [email protected]