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UK Government Department

BT smartnumbers enables a UK government department to rapidly restructure its office estate without affecting customer service

The Business Challenge

The head office was being sold and this large UK government organisation was faced with rationalising its office accommodation in short order. With 4,500 staff, it had to close some offices and merge others, while making better use of available space elsewhere. New 0300 contact numbers were to be introduced in parallel.

The government department’s Telecoms Manager explains: “We needed to be more agile and flexible to meet our customers’ needs, and able to deliver calls to wherever we need them. No longer dependent on geographic location.”

To reduce complexity and minimise disruption it was decided that people who had to move would retain their existing phone numbers until they had been relocated. The issue therefore was to maintain continuity of service simultaneously across multiple technology platforms.

Solution

The chosen solution uses BT smartnumbers, which is a fully hosted call direction service. It can carry calls virtually from anywhere to anywhere across any combination of fixed or mobile networks. Call routings can be changed online in real time, offering substantial improvements in resilience and business continuity.

The BT smartnumbers platform routes incoming calls to a BT Featurenet 1000 Hosted Voice platform. Calls are directed to twin Mitel PABXs separately located in two of the department’s data centres. To connect to end users those calls are blended with data traffic as IP telephony running over the department’s converged BT MPLS network. Class of service technology gives greater priority to voice traffic over less time-sensitive transmissions.

Meanwhile, both inbound and outbound call traffic runs over the BT Featurenet service, simplifying the network and providing the ability to load balance calls across the two data centres.

With buy-in from key stakeholders, including the department’s Finance Director and Chief Information Officer, the solution took just six months to implement. This was driven by the need to complete the project before the head office sale was completed. On the final day at the old building the phones were switched off and the numbers were simply transferred to the BT smartnumbers platform, assuring service continuity.

Initially the new solution caters for the 1,500 people affected by the moves, but will be scaled to eventually incorporate all 4,500 staff. Business units that have not yet made the transition will continue to run their old systems for now, but the plan is to bring everyone into the IP telephony environment. Existing ISDN30 links will be disconnected as legacy voice is converged into the data environment. Each member of staff will be assigned a new 0300 phone number to run in parallel with their old number for a period using BT smartnumbers to smooth the transition.

"BT smartnumbers was the only solution that enabled us to meet both our short term and long term objectives," confirms the Telecoms Manager. "It’s straightforward, it avoids complicated re-routing of calls, and we can keep our old numbers as long as we need them."

Value

The BT smartnumbers and BT Hosted Voice solution has enabled the department to maintain seamless business continuity during its radical accommodation restructuring. The added business agility means that future relocation projects can be similarly seamless. Business continuity is improved too. If for whatever reason a site becomes unavailable, calls can be quickly redirected to another location using BT smartnumbers.

Voice calls can now be delivered wherever they are needed using either the old telephone numbers or the new 0300 services. Moreover, the old telephone numbers can run in parallel with the new for as long as necessary. This means the cost and upheaval of changing longstanding published contact numbers is minimised.

BT smartnumbers and BT Hosted Voice are provided and managed from within the BT network cloud. This means not only that carrier class availability is assured, but also that no up-front capital expenditure is necessary. Naturally, the solution is backed by comprehensive management information and reporting.

Operating costs have already reduced. Voice calls are now carried at no additional cost over the converged BT MPLS infrastructure, enabling the cessation of dedicated ISDN voice services at some sites. Converging voice at selected sites has enabled the reuse of legacy structured cabling, formerly used for voice services alone, allowing more people to be accommodated without additional in-building cabling.

Overall, the near-term solution is cost neutral, but this is set to change. The Telecoms Manager concludes: "In the longer term, once the solution is rolled out to all 4,500 employees, savings of up to 40 per cent are expected."