Love the system, but not the reliability
September 07, 2013

Love the system, but not the reliability

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 2 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Software Version

Sky: Hosted VOIP

Modules Used

  • VOIP, Call Center, Call Manager

Overall Satisfaction

  • 4 digit dialing between offices.
  • Easy to make adds/moves/changes
  • Users can log into any phone at any office and turn it into their extension
  • Quick response times from tech support
  • Call Center is buggy. Sometimes users can't log into it.
  • Shoretel has had multiple problems with outages
  • Slow to respond to more serious problems
  • More expensive than their competitors
  • Slow to acknowledge problem areas
  • Lower hardware costs, better customer service
The reliability problems I've had with the system has caused me to question whether I made the right selection. When it works, it's perfect. When it doesn't work, it's tough.
They have since rebuilt our cluster. Since that time the system has only had one, very brief, outage. I'm waiting to see if the reliablility gets better. I'm giving them a couple of months to get their act together.

Product Usage

95 - Sales, Service, Administration, IT
  • Easier to manage
  • Phones work anywhere they can plug into an internet router
  • Ties our different locations and remote workers together via 4-digit dialing

Evaluation and Selection

Star to Star, Mitel. I chose this system because of their reputation, level of service, and an excellent sales process.

Implementation

Awesome rollout. Very smooth transition from old phone system to the new one.
  • Vendor implemented
  • Implemented in-house

Training

  • Online training
  • Self-taught
No complaints
Very easy to learn. No complaints here.

Configuration

Setting up basic voicemail functions, passwords. Nothing big or demanding.

Support

Tech support is quick. Very courteous on the phone. Unfortunately, they don't seem to know much when a major problem is happening. Sometimes I'm aware of an outage before they are. This is not a problem with their tech support workers as much as a company problem where they aren't sharing basic info with their front line help desk.
No - There is no premium support. Their tech support is usually quick to pick up and very responsive.

Usability

The phones are easy to use, easy to login to. Intuitive settings. Required very little user training.

Reliability

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.
Call quality is crystal clear.

Integration

  • I would like it to integrate with our ERP system, but they can't do that yet.
Yes. My vendor already integrates with the inhouse version.

Vendor Relationship

Awesome sales process. Couldn't have been better. Post sales was fine, but the relationship faltered as their reliability became more of an issue.
Challenge their pricing as their competitors are cheaper. I was able to negotiate away the install costs. Shoretel picked up the tab on that saving me several thousand dollars.