ShoreTel Sky, a young company with a lot of promise.
July 05, 2014
ShoreTel Sky, a young company with a lot of promise.
Score 5 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
Sky
Overall Satisfaction with ShoreTel Sky
ShoreTel Sky has been implemented across three companies that I manage and support. At my location in Orlando Florida, it is used as a test base for service and hardware, however, we currently have ShoreTel Sky deployed at three of our offices across the U.S. It address an issue we were having regarding continuity. We had several phone systems scattered across 8 different offices and ShoreTel Sky is providing us a unified way to manage multiple office locations with one interface. I am the only Telecom Engineer for all three business entities so having one interface is a huge plus for some one like me.
- The first would be the web interface. You can access everything you need from the web portal and having everything in one location, provides the administrator (me) with the ability to provide quick responses to problems and requests. The web portal is very well organized and somewhat easy to navigate. Once you explore a little, everything is easy to access and change.
- The second would be customer service. Whenever I have encountered a problem that I may not now how to fix or deal with, calling the customer care number is painless and quick. They provide 1st class customer service which any user can call up with their ShoreTel number and get help if I am not reachable. They still require verification from administrators in case it is a big system change, but every day issues are no problem. I'm a big advocate for good, quality customer service and they provide that for sure.
- The first would be QOS. The environment our business operates in does not allow for outages in regards to voice. I have had issues with services being cut off for maintenance and was not notified. My phones have a tendency to update in the middle of the day which takes up to 5 minutes or in the middle of a phone call. These conditions are not very acceptable and it has prevented us from moving ShoreTel Sky into more areas
- Billing is another sore issue. They seem to have issues organizing an invoice that is clear as to what charges are for. We had an issue getting the invoices separated in regards to location when we first started our service. It was a nightmare for accounting. They don't seem to focus on these types of details and its probably the biggest gripe I have with them.
- Accessibility is my third complaint. Although the web interface is great, it is your only way to access the system. If they had a website problem, we would be up a creek without a paddle. It would be nice if they had an App that you could access your system on and I realize we can't always have it our way, but not having any software to download or other ways to access your system, it makes me worry at times because no setup is perfect and in the event of any emergency, we are at their technicians mercy.
- The only other complaint I have is I would like there to be more Mac OS X support. For windows, they have all kinds of software and plugin's, but for mac, all you get is ShoreTel Sky Communicator which no one really uses. Mac support would be great, but not a requirement.
- Customer service is a big plus, they have a great customer service team that always answers and always works to fix the problem.
- Their cost has significantly reduced our monthly costs in terms of cost-per-person.
- The outages have really caused some concern about taking this mainstream with our three companies. Phones are critical in our work environment so although what we have works 95% of the time, that 5 percent keeps me from moving further ahead with ShoreTel.
ShoreTel Sky scores big on customer services and compared to the competition (XO, Avaya, etc...) they are very accessible which is huge, especially in regards to getting problems fixed. Cost wise they are very, very competitive and they beat everyone else's prices we looked at. I can't say the reliability is there for a call center environment, but they are getting better. They take suggestions for their apps and software. Overall I am pleased with them, they are a young services with plenty of growing to do, but I would recommend them to most.