asterisk users - Jul 2005 - 12 seat call centre with Asterisk, VoIP only, UK - possible?

Hi,
I've had an inquiry for a small UK call centre, mostly outbound calls.
I get the impression they
are mainly calling 3G mobile phones, monthly phone bill, with calls is
approx ?5,000 for several
feature lines.

How feasible is something like this with asterisk?

I guess one big question is which type of circuit to use, ADSL in the
UK is only 256kbs upstream,
some providers do bonding but I'm not sure its supported fully by BT :(
The other option is SDSL which is not too cheap!

Then there is the choice of a reliable SIP provider. Do others doing
this have accounts with 2 or 3
providers as fallback?

Thanks for any comments.

Mike

Mike Dent wrote:
> I guess one big question is which type of circuit to use, ADSL in the
> UK is only 256kbs upstream,
> some providers do bonding but I'm not sure its supported fully by BT :(
> The other option is SDSL which is not too cheap!
SDSL is dirt cheap.  1MB SDSL is only ?275/month.. you're probably 
looking at 4 times that for a 1MB leased line.

A ?15/month ADSL line is just not going to cut it for a business.  256k 
is a going to support about 3 lines of ulaw maximum, and there is *no* 
SLA on DSL - if it goes down for a week you're hosed, and so probably is 
your business.

Talk to BT about getting an ISDN30 line put in... you'll get some sort 
of guaranteed quality and it'll be much better than a pure SIP solution.

Tony

Mike Dent wrote:
> Hi,
> I've had an inquiry for a small UK call centre, mostly outbound calls.
> I get the impression they
> are mainly calling 3G mobile phones, monthly phone bill, with calls is
> approx ?5,000 for several
> feature lines.
> 
> How feasible is something like this with asterisk?
> 
> I guess one big question is which type of circuit to use, ADSL in the
> UK is only 256kbs upstream,
> some providers do bonding but I'm not sure its supported fully by BT :(
> The other option is SDSL which is not too cheap!
If most calls are to mobiles on *known* networks (and I know it may be 
difficult to work out which network a number is on, so this may not work 
for you ...) might it not be cheaper to get hold of a 3G gateway and 
route at least some of your calls directly over the relevant mblie network ?

jd


-- 

John Daragon                                          john@argv.co.ok
argv[0] limited
Lambs Lawn Cottage,  Staple Fitzpaine,  Taunton,  TA3 5SL,  UK
v +44 (0) 1460 234068   f +44 (0) 1460 234069   m +44 (0) 7836 576127

Mike Dent wrote:
>Hi,
>I've had an inquiry for a small UK call centre, mostly outbound calls.
>I get the impression they
>are mainly calling 3G mobile phones, monthly phone bill, with calls is
>approx ?5,000 for several
>feature lines.
>
>How feasible is something like this with asterisk?
>  
>
For calls to mobile networks in the UK, it would probably be a good 
option to use some Quescom or 2N GSM gateways in conjunction with 
Asterisk to terminate the calls.

For example, calls to Orange mobiles from Orange network are about 7p. 
Using a BT landline, it's about 30p...

Plus, Nildram does DSL bonding which is nice. You could get a couple of 
fast DSL lines and use this in conjunction with Asterisk to direct the 
calls to a couple of VoIP providers. With a little bit of AGI scripting, 
you could set up Asterisk to use PSTN in the rare instances where IP 
connectivity gets too bad.
>Then there is the choice of a reliable SIP provider. Do others doing
>this have accounts with 2 or 3
>providers as fallback?
>  
>
VoIPJet + NuFone works sortof OK.

> Talk to BT about getting an ISDN30 line put in... you'll get some sort 
> of guaranteed quality and it'll be much better than a pure SIP
solution.
>Talk to anyone APART from BT, their pricing is much more than OLOs etc.

Who else can I order an ISDN30 line from in the UK?? I am looking for one at the
moment.


?300pm for a 2Mbs /  sdsl / 1:1 contention / no router / seems to be the
cheapest going rate.
You shouldn't run anything important like that on an uncontended service as
you are not sure of
your bandwidth.
I would put a pure internet solution (using ulaw/alaw) between a mobile and a
landline due to
variances in call quality.

Especially if it is mostly inbound I would stick with ISDN & carrier pre
select.

Thanks


		
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