The Multiple Sclerosis Society and Hosted VoIP

The Business Background

The Multiple Sclerosis Society is the UK's largest charity for people affected by Multiple Sclerosis. The Society, whose mission is to help enable people suffering with MS to live their lives to full potential, funds MS research, runs respite care centres, provides grants, education and training on MS.

The MS Society, which was founded in 1953 and has 350 local branches across the UK with a central office based in London and regional headquarters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, is a large charity that in terms of its operations should be viewed to have the same needs as a large corporation. Furthermore Many MS sufferers work for the society whether from home, central or regional offices.

As a charity, the MS Society need to make sure they are getting the best possible service in terms of cost and quality, every cost is accountable. Any expenditure that isn’t bettering their company or their cause is deemed wasteful. Having the most cost effective technology that enhances communication is therefore an essentiality. 

The Challenge

Unique industry with unique Business Needs

The Multiple Sclerosis Society has unique business and personnel needs. MS is a debilitating disease and the most common disabling neurological condition affecting young adults. The MS Society makes it their mission to employ MS sufferers, either within their offices throughout the UK or as home-workers. These home-workers need to be able to be a part of the larger office network and contactable at all times within the communications system, be it currently via office email and phone and in the near future by video conferencing.

Furthermore The MS Society had needed to cut down their constant travelling for meetings between the four regional locations throughout the UK. As a Company that need to look at every outgoing cost they needed a solution that would enhance inter-company communications with such features as video conferencing and therefore reducing the need to meet in person. Furthermore to have a communications solution, which enabled home-workers to be contactable by a simple extension code, as well as appearing on the larger network was ideal.

Understanding the Clients’ Needs

Previously, each home worker would simply use their own home phone, on their own home phone number. Not ideal, and almost impossible due to the preparations of conducting conference calls and transferring calls.

Put simply The MS Society needed a new phone system that would support their status of a forward thinking and well-resourced organisation. The existing phone system at the head office was thought to be at least 12 years old and was prohibitive in that it would not scale up to accept any more users. Furthermore the lack of features was also becoming restrictive to the Society’s work so the decision was made that a new, modern, scalable IP phone system was needed. Furthermore The MS Society needed a cost-effective and future-proof communications infrastructure that would allow the sharing of important information via voice, data and ultimately video conferencing across all four regions.

With many home workers suffering from MS, and with some unable to get online or able to efficiently use a softphone, a bespoke IP solution was essential. Furthermore for the MS Society workforce to get full usage from the solution one-to-one management, site installation and individual training was essential.

The Solution

Innovative Solution for Greater Productivity

The MS Society needed a new telephone system and asked their communications consultancy, IP Solutions, to source a provider. IP Solutions invited Voicenet Solutions, a leading UK hosted VoIP supplier to tender and were then contracted to implement the system.

Voicenet Solutions could have simply given MSS and their 4 main offices a shiny new phone system and left it at that.

Instead, however after extensive consultation gathering information on the needs of all employees and their communication usage and the logistics around the many locations including home-workers, Voicenet Solutions were able to devise a rollout of the product that would enable the MS society to gain as much from their new communications solution as possible.

Implementing the Hosted VoIP Solution

What MSS wanted to see from its selected VoIP provider was a fully operational product that was not only cost effective but was at the forefront of modern telephony technology and offered features that would enhance employee connectivity. Furthermore The MS Society stipulated that the product be ready to go straight away, it should have full QoS, and that the level of servicing and support was crucial.

Training

Voicenet Solutions employ a dedicated training team to give thorough training in the use of the Hosted VoIP software as well as the features available on the Cisco handset. All training is delivered to the end users at the customer’s premises. Prior to training, each customer is involved in a training needs analysis where Voicenet Solutions ascertain their training requirements, identify the features they have provisioned and identify any additional features or products they may benefit from.  The training delivery then encourages the user to use more features, increasing revenue, and provides an opportunity to demonstrate and recommend any missing products or features identified.  

Bespoke One to One Training

The MS Society’s requirement were more specific than most companies. Quite simply they could not use the IP solution to the best of their ability if certain members of staff couldn’t make the training day and go against the point of installing a new phone system.

So it was felt that members of the team that couldn’t make it to headquarter training days due to their disabilities and specific travelling needs were given one-to-one training in the comfort of their own homes.

These training days took place all over the UK including Scotland and Northern Ireland in the employees homes. Once an engineer had set-up routers and the Cisco phones the training would commence.

Within minutes, the MSS employee was on their office network and part of the greater communications infrastructure, a benefit previous networks had not been able to offer.

Cisco user guides

Voicenet Solutions have produced online VoIP phone user guides available to all customers to use after their training days. These interactive guides are available to anyone at the Voicenet Solutions website http://www.voicenet-solutions.com/ip-phones/application-guides for everyday trouble shooting and self-teaching.

However, some of the MS Society home workers were unable to easily use a computer or go through the user guides online. At no extra cost Voicenet Solutions reproduced all guides, in a easier, more manageable way for all employees to use independently.  

MPLS Network

Voicenet Solutions also oversaw the implementation of an MPLS data network so as to share information via voice, data and ultimately video conferencing throughout the four main regions of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. This IP backbone sits on the same VPN to converge voice and data and enables new developments for the organisation’s communication needs for the future.

Contact Centre

Voicenet Solutions are already looking at running out a contact centre for the Multiple Sclerosis society based on a hosted VoIP network. This should be complete by the end of 2008.

The Outcome

It is only since the system has been in full use that MSS is able to fully understand the benefits of the Voicenet Solutions hosted VoIP solution both in costs and enhanced connectivity.

Conference calls are now a natural part of the day for all employees. Members of staff who work in regional offices, at the HQ in London or at home can now all talk as one unified business. Before coneference calls were expensive and difficult to organise.

Furthermore many regional meetings would be held at any one of the regional offices. Having a more enhanced communications solution cuts down airfares and the company’s carbon footprint.

The main benefit of this solution, with the training, the effect of being on one single network via hosted VoIP, is that all members of the MS Society can now feel part of the entire network, working and communicating together as one entity.