| Fibre to the premises (FTTP) or ‘full fibre’ | Fibre-optic cables right to your office. The fastest and most desirable connection, usually. Can be expensive for faster versions (gigabit speed) but the cost may be fully justified if you have high demands. |
| Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) | The fast fibre ends in a street cabinet near you, and the last stretch to your office is over copper cables. A cheaper hybrid solution. Max speed is around 80 megabits. |
| Ethernet | If you can’t get fibre, this is probably the next best thing. Max speed depends on location, but is likely about 80 megabits. Likely to have business-grade support and features. |
| ADSL | Piggy-backing on your old copper phone line, ADSL is widely available, and it can be relatively cheap. Speed varies dependent on distance from the exchange – from a few megabits up to around 20. Reliability can be poor at some sites. |
| Virgin Cable | Virgin use a combination of fibre-optic and high-grade copper cables to provide up to 300 megabits to your premises. We can tell you if this is an option, as they don’t cover all addresses. |
| Mobile Data | With good 4G or 5G mobile coverage, mobile data can be viable in some scenarios, particularly as a fallback. |
Firewalls
When up-rating your internet connection speed, make sure you have a firewall that can process your data at the new speeds. Faster connections need faster firewalls!
Redundancy
As part of your risk management, you should consider having two ways to connect to the internet, or a mitigation strategy in case of problems. We can help you with this.
Telephone Connections
SIP Displaces ISDN
For over forty years, business phones have been connected using ISDN. With a switch-off date of 2025, any system that still uses ISDN will need to be modernised quite soon.
Modern systems often connect to the wider telephone system (the ‘PSTN’) via a method called SIP. The SIP connection (a ‘SIP trunk’) can run over your existing internet connection, if it’s fast and reliable enough.
We can set you up with a SIP provider, seamlessly move your phone numbers over, and your calls will be handled by the new provider.
Advantages of SIP
Cheaper line rental and calls costs
Fast and economical setup
Can be interfaced to most systems, including Microsoft Teams voice calling
Emergency re-routing, and other fault tolerance
Easy call data reporting
Easy to scale up when demand increases
Better call quality
Survey
You probably have more questions. Some of the answers would depend on a discussion or survey on what you’re running today, and the location of your premises.
Get in touch and we can establish your options.
