Enterprise voice networks are very dynamic. Economic cycles, mergers and acquisitions, consolidations, expansions and reorganizations can all cause dramatic fluctuations in network load. Increased use of alternate technologies, such as mobile phones, e-mail and VoIP, are driving down the use of traditional PBX networks. Given the intermingling of these factors, determining and maintaining optimal network capacity levels is a difficult task at best. 

Engineering Methodologies
Traditional voice network engineering methodologies limit visibility into network load and look at load and service from the equipment perspective instead of the caller. Limited visibility is rooted in the common long-standing practice of using traffic studies to evaluate network load and determine capacity requirements. The typical study is short in duration, often just 5 days.  Even if repeated quarterly, most network managers are not willing to risk their reputation that this approach will yield reliable results across all network components across all seasons of a year.

With no confidence in the study results and the need to mitigate the risk of service failures, many companies purchase insurance by subscribing for excess capacity from their service providers. Most don’t realize the typical company has, over time, built up more than 40% excess capacity, costing tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars each and every year.

Viewing network load and service from the equipment perspective instead of the call perspective also leads to the purchase of unnecessary network capacity. Traditional engineering methodologies and traffic studies only look at the load and service on an individual trunk (a.k.a. circuit) group basis. Networks are not that simple. By design, call routing schemes allow calls to flow from one trunk group to another as trunk groups run out of available circuits. Traditional engineering methodologies report that service was denied indicating that additional capacity should be purchased. In reality, callers indeed got service without the additional circuits, as the call routing scheme made additional circuits available in other trunk groups.

Caller Grade of Service
So how are your call routing schemes working? Are they optimized? These questions are only answered properly when load and service are evaluated from the caller perspective.

Now, how do you plan for changes in your enterprise caused by site expansion or consolidation? Are you ready to migrate to an IP network? Do you know how much traffic is being handled by your IPDAs or how many IP channels are needed?

Provided the right data and the right metrics from the caller perspective, you are ready to face the key challenges of voice network engineering.

• Cost Control – Optimize network capacity to avoid unnecessary equipment purchases, maintenance fees and public network access fees.
• Service Provider Negotiation – Are you at the mercy of the provider to determine bandwidth and circuits you should be putting under contract?
• Diagnosing Service Issues – Do you have a mechanism to flag problems or are you waiting days or hours to find out about problems?

Solutions with Impact overcome the limitations and complications of the industry’s traditional methodologies.  Impact provides a simple, more reliable alternative to manage your telecommunications expenses and network engineering in a proactive manner.