MiCloud Connect is a business communications solution for contact centers that includes features like IP PBX telephony service, desk phones, softphone, and collaboration tools. It is integrable with other business communication technology, including Microsoft Outlook and CRM software.
$20.99
per user/per month
Mitel MiCollab
Score 6.5 out of 10
N/A
Mitel MiCollab is a collaboration and conferencing tool for enterprises, from Canadian company Mitel.
Similar overall goals, but ShoreTel is easier to use from both a user standpoint as well as administrative standpoint. ShoreTel easily can be supported internally whereas Mitel would require more pro services
Mitel is more well known within the IT world and had better ratings. That is why our IT department went with Mitel MiCollab. Plus it was compatible with all our devices and suited all our needs as an organization.
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.
MiCollab is great for a large office to get users working from home and being able to use their home phone or cell phone like the desk phone at the office. This allows our live operators the ability to see if the end-user is on an active call before sending a new call to them. If you have a very small company of fewer than 10 people this might not be worth the investment as cell phones would work just as well.
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.
Mitel MiCollab is great for working remotely. The twinning feature to allow calls directed to my office phone to ring on my cell phone is extremely convenient.
The feature that allows you to set which device you want to ring (desk phone, PC, cell phone) is great as even when I am in the office, I prefer to just use my cell phone.
The customer support for the product is first-rate. They are always present and helpful when needed.
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
Support is typically handled by a reseller. Buyers should evaluate the reseller as much as they evaluate Mitel for the product suite. The few times when the reseller was not able to handle the issue directly, Mitel did step up and quickly answer/address the question/issue.
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.
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.
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
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.
MiCollab was great as a VOIP solution and general team collaboration solution, but it lacked in some areas, such as the mobile app, complex configuration and set up as well as the lack of user customization. Overall, the system is serviceable, but seemed rather vanilla compared to its competitors
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
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.
I'm not a person in a position to really speak to this question as I'm only a user and not involved in purchasing such services. Overall, though, I believe we switched to this to save money and since we seem to be sticking with it, I have to assume that objective has been achieved.
