Before you understand the benefits of cloud-based PBX for small businesses, you need to understand what a PBX is. PBX stands for private branch exchange. This is a telephone switch tying together a phone network within an organization that allows users to talk to one another. The different hardware components of this network work together to provide connectivity for office phones, fax machines, credit card readers, and other devices. In a nutshell, a PBX is a company’s internal phone switch. When someone calls the reception and asks to talk to a specific person in the company, PBX handles the re-routing of that call.
Advantages of opting for cloud-based PBX
Lower Costs
Internet-based PBX is not dependent on the land-based telephone network because it uses the Internet to connect all telephony devices. This increases the range over which the PBX phone system can operate. And that’s where cost savings come from. Each business location no longer requires its dedicated business PBX and phone lines. Your business location no longer plays a role in the cost of your phone calls. The entire organization can easily consolidate the communication infrastructure in one single cloud-based phone system. This makes routing calls from one office branch to the other possible.
Time Savings
The setup of the cloud-based PBX is typically hassle-free. Deploying cloud-based phone systems in small companies is practically plug-and-play. With the land-based PBX, you used to have to add many new lines and possibly update office wiring. In the case of cloud-based PBX, however, you can do it in a matter of a few minutes within a few clicks.
Keeping the Old Phone System
Keeping your conventional phone system in this day and age is becoming prohibitively expensive as telecoms continue to eliminate the old TDM network components. POTS lines and PRIs are either entirely on their way out or experience 10-fold cost hikes. All this makes switching to a VoIP-based Cloud PBX a commonsense option.
Flexibility
With the cloud-based PBX, anyone can connect to a colleague whether the colleague is at the home, office, or on vacation a thousand miles away. All you need is a VoIP phone, or a VoIP app on a smartphone or tablet, or a desktop. This allows the employee’s freedom to work from anywhere in the world using their preferred device.
With the cloud-based PBX, business communications are no longer restricted to a specific location. And that is a beautiful thing for so many businesses.