Phone System Services -Lombard, IL 60148

Whether you need a legacy phone system maintained, or an entirely new communications system for multiple offices, Andromeda Technology Solutions is the answer you have been looking for. As our expertise also includes complete data network solutions, you can rest assured that we can fully integrate a communications system that will best leverage your existing or future IT infrastructure.

In many cases, your telephone system is the first thing people will experience when dealing with your business.

• Does it show your company in a good light?
• Is it set up so your clients have a good experience?
• Does it help maximize employee productivity?

Let us show you how a phone system should be set up!

Experience the simplicity of having an experienced company to handle all aspects of your communication systems, letting you focus on running your business.

Contact us or fill out the Request form on this page now to ask us to contact you!

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Hybrid PBX and IP-based Phone Systems

We support a host of major phone systems—from Avaya, NEC, Panasonic to Toshiba— and are a certified Panasonic dealer for both a traditional PBX system, as well as a true IP-based VoIP system. The beauty of these systems lies in their very extensive feature set (over 800 features) and their mix-and-match capabilities. Each system can mix analog, digital and IP phone sets to match almost any application. Also, each system has extensive functionality built-in for incorporating branch offices, work-at-home employees and other remote workers.

We spend a great deal of time understanding all your requirements, so we can select the system and functions that are exactly what you need.

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The Phones Become the Network

If you are considering an IP-based telephone system, it is important to understand these systems are more data systems than phone systems. Unlike a traditional PBX system, a VoIP system puts a significant burden on your data network, and requires specific equipment and configuration to ensure everything is running properly.

Many traditional telephone service companies lack the skills to properly install and maintain a VoIP system. Andromeda Technology Solutions excels in all aspects of voice and data, and will ensure you get the system that is right for you.

Whether Cloud-based, Hosted/virtual PBX, or completely on-premises, we have the knowledge AND experience to guide you and implement your voice communication system to perfection.

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Replacement of Legacy Phone Systems

We have many years of experience upgrading/replacing legacy phones systems from: ComDial, Nortel, Toshiba/Mitel, and Samsung just to name a few. If you would like to experience service from a truly customer-focused organization, call us when you are ready to replace and upgrade your existing legacy telephone system.

			KX-TA KX-NCP KX-TDA KS-TDE
			IP Office Definity Magix Legend Partner
			Aspire Elite IPK I-Series DS/DSX

AndroPedia Tech Library

As part of our service, it is important to keep our client-partners well informed on Telephone system developments, news, and best practices. Here is just a sampling of typical items from our AndroPedia^SM library archive:

What is Auto Attendant?

Auto Attendant is one of the most common applications we install with business phone systems.

It is a standard application that can satisfy many different tasks/needs.

In a nutshell, an auto attendant is a programmed add on for your phone system that will help answer calls and can route callers to proper destinations. Think of it as a receptionist program.

You can program the auto attendant to route calls during specific hours and you can also program different messages/directories to operate at different times of the day.

Most prospective customers will turn to the internet to do preliminary research for products and services.

But . . . once they’ve found the company or companies they are interested in, a phone call is still the most popular first step to contact your business and engage your services.

So, that means you’ve got a decision to make. You need to decide whether you want a live person to answer the phone and route your calls, or whether you would rather skip that step and have a program do the heavy lifting for you.

For many small to midsized businesses, the auto attendant is a great way to reduce overhead and make sure calls never goes unanswered.

Auto Attendant Best Practices

Proper auto attendant design and implementation is essential to the overall experience an inbound caller will have every time they pick up the phone and dial your number.

Some key factors to think about when designing your system:

• Make sure your introductory message is clear and concise – you don’t want people to get bored or annoyed with a long message every time they call in.
• Avoid too many options – nobody enjoys sifting through 14 options to find the place they are looking for.
• Keep it simple and keep it logical – prioritize your most popular departments/options towards the beginning of your message to speed up the inbound call process.
• Your directory needs to be up to date – who will be in charge of managing this?

Three Unique Ways You Can Use Auto Attendant

1. Use your auto attendant function to answer FAQs

Do people call your office often with the same questions? You can dedicate a space in your auto attendant directory to frequently requested info like your address, your hours of operation and more. This will save your receptionist and staff valuable time and provide prospects with the info they are calling to acquire.

2. Add a Directory

There are multiple different types of directory options available to you.

• Full list of staff extensions
• Search by first or last name for staff
• Department Directory

The option you choose is based on what you believe will be easiest and most helpful for inbound callers. By implementing a directory you avoid an endless list of options on your primary outgoing message and also add a layer of organization that prospects/customers appreciate.

3. Share Upcoming Event & Company Announcements

Your auto attendant program can actually be used as a great marketing tool for upcoming events and promotions. Have a seasonal promotion coming up? What about an office closing due to a holiday? Maybe there is some big news specific to your industry you want to share? All of these are things pieces of information you can distribute to inbound callers.

**Added Tip** Your Music on Hold (MOH) message can also promote events and promotions for you.

The post Auto Attendant: 3 Unique Ways You Can Use It To Improve Your Business appeared first on Andromeda Technology Solutions.

Have you ever spoken with a telecom salesman? If you have, you probably noticed they speak in what appears to be code. PRI . . . POTS lines . . . PBX . .  .VOIP? What does any of this even mean?

Lucky for you, we decoded some of the most common telecom acronyms so that even you can speak phone system.

 Most Popular Telecom Acronyms

• VoIP – (Voice over Internet Protocol) is an alternative way of making phone calls. VoIP transmits the sounds you make over the Internet. There are different styles of VoIP systems but the two most common are cloud based and on premise.
• SIP – (Session Initiation Protocol) is an industry standard method of achieving VoIP.  Telephone Systems and many communications devices now have the ability to perform SIP protocol by way of trunk access (dial tone), video, etc.
• PRI – (Primary Rate Interface) a multi-channel digital circuit that brings 24 lines of telephone system communication for incoming/outgoing dial tone. Essentially, it allows multiple inbound and outbound calls at one time. This is often a less expensive approach for a company that has more than 10 analog (POTS) lines.
• PBX (Private Branch Exchange) This is typically a physical box on location at your business that holds all the programming required to make calls, transfer calls, host Voicemail and many other key functions.
• POTS – (Plain Old Telephone Service) also known as analog telephone lines.
• IP-PBX – (Internet Protocol-Private Branch Exchange) is a telephone system that integrates with Internet functionality such as VoIP and SIP services.
• PSTN – (Public Switched Telephone Network) is known as traditional telephone lines.
• ISDN – (Integrated Services Digital Network) is a set of communication standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the traditional circuits of the PSTN.

More questions? No worries, check out our Telecom Phone Systems page and let us help answer some of your additional questions! Or reach out to us for a conversation about your needs.

The post Phone Systems Decoded – 8 Commonly Used Telecom Acronyms & What They Actually Mean appeared first on Andromeda Technology Solutions.

Are you a fan of customizing your Windows experience via themes? If so, you're not alone. While it's true that themes aren't used by a majority of Windows users, they're still highly popular.

If you're creating your own themes, you don't have anything to worry about. The danger lies in downloading theme packs from others, especially if you get them from a source you don't know and trust implicitly.

Clever hackers can now create "poisoned" themes that can be used to steal Windows credentials. Security researcher Jimmy Bayne discovered the new flaw when he stumbled across a poisoned theme capable of tricking unsuspecting users into accessing a remote SMB share that requires authentication.

When the user attempts to access the remote resource that requires a login, Windows responds by automatically trying to log in, using your Windows user name and their hashed password. Naturally, the hacker sets up the attack so that they control the remote resource and thus, is able to harvest the credentials and dehash the password at their leisure.

Microsoft has spent the last few years migrating away from local Windows 10 accounts and is leaning more heavily on the Cloud. This makes the theme-based attack much more likely to succeed.

Even worse, Microsoft has expressed no interest in fixing this particular flaw, because according to a spokesman for the company, it's working exactly as it is supposed to. That puts regular theme users in something of a bind.

Your first best defense against this type of attack is to make any themes you want to use yourself, or if you download a theme pack, be sure you're getting it from a trusted source.

Barring that, your only other viable option is to block or re-associate the .theme, .themepack, or .desktopthemepackfile extensions to a different program. This approach, however, will break the theme functionality, so it can only be used by those who don't need to frequently switch from one theme to another.

It's not a common attack, but it's definitely something to be on guard against.

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