Likelihood to Recommend 8x8 is well suited for our small private practice. Even though we are close to each other, it makes managing and transferring calls effortless. Concurrent calls are also a strong suit. Even if two people are logged into the same user account, being able to answer two lines at the same time and flip between devices is a great feature to have.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Mitel is excellent at allowing me as a user to setup up custom call routing in response to rapidly changing work flows. If I need to work from home for a period due to medical or other reasons, logging into Mitel and setting my office phone to ring through to my home or cell is quick and simple. Changing back is just as quick.
Read full review Pros Automatically routes incoming calls to the available agent with the appropriate skills, ensuring that customers are served promptly. Integrates with email systems to provide a unified view of customer interactions. Allows sales representatives to share their screens with customers and prospects, demonstrating products and services effectively. Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
The system up-time has been 100% over 3 years. With separate systems and two locations we used to have to fake the system into 4 digit dialing by forwarding all remote extensions to DIDs. Now with Shortel extended to the remote location we have true 4 digit dialing. The Shortel desktop application makes managing calls and call routing a breeze for even our most novice users. Read full review Cons 8x8's emails with billing info or auto-payments does not attach a pdf copy of the invoice for reference; you have to log in to your dashboard and navigate through several links to obtain a copy of your invoice, which is frankly just inconvenient. While 8x8 is very feature rich, a lot of it appears to be oriented towards call centers and therefore may not be required or useful for small offices (like ours). While 8x8 is very responsive to issues affecting its system, the frequent update alerts can become distracting. Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
There are persistent problems with the app's functionality on mobile devices. At times, the web conferencing service may have delays. It appears to be less stable than competing approaches. Using a headset instead of the microphone and speakers integrated into a desktop computer slows down the softphone's performance. Read full review Likelihood to Renew All our employees love this product. No one has ever had an issue, whether it be the phone or fax. Great during the winter when employees have to work from home because of the snow. Never had an issue with the phone app. Highly recommend this product
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Although the price is higher than some of the other Hosted systems out there, the value is definitely worth a renewal. Everything is relative: there are some companies out there who need phones, but don't necessarily care how they work, the functionality/features available/durability etc., they just care that they have phones that make and receive calls. There are other companies that are completely reliant on phones and certain functionality that is provided by the system. There are even some companies who are straight up dependent on the phone system and are losing tons of money anytime they are down, ShoreTel is the perfect fit for theSMB client who sees value in a solid,robust, reliable and high functioning phone system
Read full review Usability Again for a large call center with many needs, and full time people to manage this may be a good system, but for a small business needing a phone system in my opinion it is overly complicated and difficult to manage without multiple calls on support.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
I have not used a wide array of communication software, but this far ShoreTel/MiCloud has been the simplest and easiest to get into. My work employs several temps at certain points throughout the year, and they use this piece of software frequently, and new hires seem to have little to no issue using this software. Additionally, this is our primary telephone communication infrastructure, and I have yet to encounter any issues when signed in and regularly using it handling external calls to our department.
Read full review Reliability and Availability As mentioned before, we have not had an outage with the phone system per say, There was an issue with the call center where we did have an outage, but it was quickly and promplty handled by 8x8 support, they got us up and going again within 24 hours. The 8x8 hard phone and softphone side of things have been rock solid, I couldn't ask for anything more seeing we are in health care and it's exactly what we were looking for. When and if there is an issue 99% of the time it's user error
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
The system has gone down on us MULTIPLE times. We asked them to move us to a different cluster. Shoretel declined. Basically we had problems or outages every month of the year from June 2012 to date. Our old phone system was just that: OLD, no bells or whistles. But it was up every day and I never had to think about it much until it was time for an upgrade. That's how I want Shoretel to be. I want it so reliable that I never have to think about it.
Read full review Performance None of the features that are available slow down the application. The reports (even the ones with hundreds of records) complete very quickly and the web interface as well as the mobile application never struggle to load or complete a task. The analytics will sometimes take some time to reflect the online status of users but it is to be expected due to connection speeds.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Even though the system uses a lower bandwidth connection we have experienced a higher call quality than our previous system which required a T1 line and back up broadband connection.
Read full review Support Rating 8x8 support can be phenomenal. After getting in touch with a support member, all of my problems are either solved right away or throughout a small time frame, fine-tuned to my circumstance/issue. Whether they are following up via phone call or email, I have full confidence and faith that any matter will be resolved. Trying to contact the support team is where things get a bit tricky. Raising an issue in the chat can be taxing as we are mostly referred to the general FAQ section of the site. Although it may be helpful to some, it does nothing for those of us that have very specific problems. If each account holder can receive access to a customer service line that differs from non-member account holders, I think we'd have a higher level of trust and a lower level of frustration.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
ShoreTel Sky's support is amazing. The only reason why I didn't give it a 10 is that we still need to contact them for stuff that we should be able to do, for ourselves, within the management portal. I know their portal is being worked on, so hopefully they will get the "little things" included for self-management.
Read full review In-Person Training The person giving the training was very engaged, He also listened and answered all the questions. He created a video for our company while he was training in case we needed to reference it again in the future. The questions he could not answer were answered within 24 hours via an email to the IT support staff here so we could share the answers with the rest of the group
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
I attended the first ShoreTel installer class in Austin,TX. It was a week of intensive study with a live lab and having hands on experience made the class worthwhile. I have taken all of the sales courses and remaining technical courses either online or self study to keep costs down. I send my techs to the first installer course in Austin as I feel it gives them a solid foundation and most of teh other courses they have taken have been online.
Read full review Online Training online (video) training is good. No issues.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
The training identified some things M5 (ShoreTel's cloud division) could provide, however it was only using it every day and asking the Shoretel support several questions that I got the hang of it. The training was able to highlight functions but I did not learn how to use the phone from the training.
Read full review Implementation Rating The implementation of 8x8 X was rather smooth. We had training prior to getting the system. The IT company did a good job on the training. The whole system is wonderful. Saves me so much time with the faxing, as i can just let it go by itself and not have to make sure pages don't get skipped, as with a regular fax machine.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Each of our locations has a dedicated ShoreTel router and managed QoS. With full management, it provides us a breath of space and bandwidth to use our resources in other means. Strongly consider the managed solution as you have to maintain more technical issues when hosting with your ISP. You have to make sure your ISP can provide you the best service for voice and data. Plug and 'hope' doesn't work with just routing your phones over any Internet connection....especially when your handsets run int he 100's
Read full review Alternatives Considered Hands down 8x8 is superior to the Spectrum Ring Central that we had tried. Interestingly, they supplied the same phone hardware but were unable to suggest an adapter for wifi for the phones. Cost wise very similar but customer experience very different. Above all else, the quality of customer service has made all the difference
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Aptela. I chose M5 (ShoreTelSky) because their platform puts call quality first. Their system also uses Cisco endpoints, which are very compatible with the rest of my Cisco network. I also liked the fact that ShoreTelSky uses the internet only as a backup for transport; I use MPLS as my primary connectivity.
Read full review Contract Terms and Pricing Model At this time, we’re very happy with the pricing model that we have worked out and they have provided for us. Just be sure to do your homework, and use your comparisons to work out your cost with 8x8. They will be very straightforward with you on what they can adjust for you.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Scalability 8x8 100% suits Business needs to connect with from anywhere and everywhere. The Softphone features is very light and very easy to use also very reliable with Zero Downtime. Can also be set personal Voicemail over softphone at anytime and logs everything is very easy to find.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
I believe that ShoreTel can be used by a minimum company size of about 25 to almost any size of a company and this can be achieved while the company grows, hence makes it pretty scalable when required. For companies which are smaller in size i.e. smaller than 25, I am not sure how useful it would be, it may be depending upon the type of business
Read full review Professional Services PS had all the users etc. set up by our go-live date. All hard phones were activated and when we received them, all we had to do was set them up and punch in the activation code to activate them.
Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
Return on Investment It's been amazing. We used to have so many complaints about call quality, phone calls cutting in and out, tons of calls where it was dead air, dropped calls etc. Since switching back to 8x8 we have not had one complaint, which is great for business! Being able to communicate with our clients is the only way for us to have a positive ROI! Read full review Mitel Networks Corporation
At my branch alone, we are saving over $500 a month using Shoretel Sky versus the phone company we were using before them. Shoretel Sky has increased customer service by allowing our employees to easily transfer a call to the proper department or branch no matter where they are located instead of giving the caller a phone number to call. Most of our locations did not have caller ID before Shoretel Sky. That feature has increased employee efficiency because when they know who is calling before they answer allows them to professionally greet their caller and have their info up on their computer as they answer. Read full review ScreenShots MiCloud Connect Screenshots