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Managed server solution ensures Stags’ clients never miss out on the most up-to-date property information

South West Communications Group has revolutionised the way Stags estate agents operates its business with a managed server solution.

Previously, all of Stags’ offices used individual servers, which meant any information added onto one server could not be shared immediately with its other branches. Each office had its own database and therefore property details uploaded at one branch were not swiftly available to the rest of the offices, potentially missing out on customer interest elsewhere in the region.

John Holdstock, South West Communications Group’s IT director, said: “Stags was keen to have a system that would update all the offices at the same time to make sure agents and their clients did not miss out on the most up-to-date information. Such prompt updating may not be as crucial for estate agents elsewhere in the UK, but people who buy property in the South West do not necessarily live in the area already and can be interested in the entire region. Stags had already sought out a web-enabled database but then required a secure and resilient hosting solution to run it from.”

South West Communications Group advised Stags to host their application on a resilient RAID 5 server meaning that fault tolerance is automatically built in as any disk can be lost within the server without loss of data.

The solution in its entirety included a complete managed server service, which meant South West Communications Group provided Stags with the rack space to store managed server equipment in its safe and secure Data Centre in Exeter that boasts built-in fire protection, privacy and power resilience. South West Communications Group also provided data backup to Stags using its own solution called storeiP. This service automatically backs up any changes made to the estate agent’s data on a daily basis to ensure data can be retrieved in the rare event of a system failure.

Mr Holdstock added: “We took on all the responsibility of Stags’ server needs with our managed server service while also using our Data Centre infrastructure and team of highly qualified IT engineers to maintain the equipment, programs and environment the server relies on. Stags could have chosen to work from a single server based at one of their offices, but it would have been highly unlikely it would be able to survive a power cut or loss of connectivity in the same way South West Communications Group’s Data Centre can.”

Peter Symons, partner of Stags, said: “We are delighted to have made the switch. We found South West Communications Group easy to deal with and, being a local company, highly accessible. To be honest, we cannot know the detail of what we have signed up to. We are happy to rely on South West Communications Group to provide the advice that we need.”

Above article posted on Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

Customers to benefit from new fault progress email notification facility

South West Communications Group is pleased to announce the introduction of its new fault progress notification facility in an effort to improve its customer service even further.

Regular fault progress reporting is essential to ensure customers are kept up to date on progress being made. Updates will now be provided via email notification.

These updates will be provided to the person who reported the fault, as long as an email address was supplied at the time of logging the issue.

An email will be generated when a fault is logged with our helpdesk and additional notifications will be -sent as the call is progressed through our system. This will include:-

•    Remote diagnostics undertaken by the support team
•    Field engineer allocated to the job
•    Engineer en-route to site

South West Communications Group hopes this facility will help in its quest to continually improve its customer service.

South West Communications Group’s fault line contact details are:

TEL:      0844 871 20 20 (option 1)
EMAIL:  helpdesk@swcomms.co.uk

Above article posted on Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

GreenSquare Group goes greener and leaner with a South West Communications Group video conferencing solution

 

GreenSquare Group has saved an estimated £28k in fuel costs and staff time while also reducing its carbon footprint in the first year of using a video conferencing solution provided by South West Communications Group and LifeSize Communications.

The housing, regeneration and social investment agency reduced travel by some 29,600 miles between its offices in Swindon, Oxford, and Chippenham leaving staff free to use the associated 744 hours more productively; the equivalent of 18 working weeks.

These figures were calculated by GreenSquare’s finance department, which was pleased to report the return on investment had been achieved in half the time allocated, therefore real savings were being realised after just one year.

Rob Fletcher, head of ICT for GreenSquare Group, said: "Video conferencing p

uts the green into GreenSquare. We not only reduce carbon emissions, improve staff satisfaction and are attractive to new business partners because we are innovative in the way we work."

South West Communications Group’s sales director Sarah Flowers said: "Some businesses have been put off using video conferencing in the past due to the restrictions of the technology available, such as poor image quality and time delays. However, technology has developed, bandwidth has become cheaper and high definition has been introduced, making video conferencing a more viable and affordable product.

"The savings made from using video conferencing meant GreenSquare had recouped its investment within the two-year specified deadline. In the first year, GreenSquare has used its video conferencing solution three to four times a week and calculated satisfying savings.

"This solution met all of GreenSquare Group’s requirements in terms of corporate responsibilities and saving money. Looking ahead, this system is scalable and could be extended to include any additional sites or workers, as well as communicating with clients or contractors who also have video conferencing capabilities, thus making further savings."

For more on this story, see:

Comms Business

 

Above article posted on Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

South West Communications Group branches into new Data Centre services

South West Communications Group has added two new services to its Data Centre portfolio to offer to both existing and new customers - virtualization and flexible bandwidth with percentile bursting.

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Above article posted on Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009

New partnership bodes well for Enterprise customers

South West Communications Group can confirm that Gamma Telecom has formed a new partnership with Alcatel-Lucent to provide SIP line/trunk services on its OmniPCX Enterprise telephony solution.

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Above article posted on Monday, November 30th, 2009

South West Communications Group provides a true one-stop shop solution to Chard Town Council

South West Communications Group has supplied a wide-ranging telephony and data solution to meet Chard Town Council’s goal of becoming a cutting edge beacon among local government organisations.

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Above article posted on Thursday, November 5th, 2009

South West Communications Group supports Chiefs' masterclass programme

Exeter Chiefs players have been heading into eight secondary schools and community colleges around the region to start this season’s South West Communications Group masterclass coaching programme.

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Above article posted on Wednesday, November 4th, 2009

South West Communications Group wins North Bristol NHS Trust contract

South West Communications Group has won a £2m contract to design and install new switchboard and telecommunications facilities to North Bristol NHS Trust, in doing so illustrating the latter’s dedication to offering world class voice services to its patients and staff.

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Above article posted on Monday, October 26th, 2009

Japan Airlines delivers dynamic multi-lingual services with the help of South West Communications Group and the new release of Alcatel-Lucent's contact centre solution

Alcatel-Lucent has announced that Japan Airlines, Asia’s largest air carrier, has deployed its IP telephony and contact centre solutions within a new European contact centre to boost responsiveness to customers, improve the provision of self-service telephone facilities, and enhance disaster recovery capabilities to ensure business continuity. South West Communications Group was also central to the deployment.

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Above article posted on Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009

South West Communications Group's Hampshire office celebrates 20 years

The Hampshire branch of South West Communications Group has recently celebrated its 20th anniversary. The leading business telephony, network and data centre services provider set up its first branch in the region on August 14, 1989.

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Above article posted on Monday, August 17th, 2009

South West Communicaitons Group urges businesses to change their 0870 numbers before it's too late

South West Communications Group has urged businesses to change their revenue-earning 0870 numbers before they in fact end up costing them money.

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Above article posted on Friday, June 19th, 2009

Order extra broadband online today

South West Communications Group has continued in its efforts to make life easier for its customers by offering its high quality broadband services for ordering online.

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Above article posted on Tuesday, June 9th, 2009

South West Communications Group launches free download of its data backup service

South West Communications Group has launched its free 30-day trial of its excellent storeiP data backup service.

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Above article posted on Wednesday, May 20th, 2009

South West Communications Group bowls in as main sponsor of Budleigh Salterton Cricket Club

South West Communications Group has widened its sports sponsorship portfolio by signing up to become the main sponsors of Budleigh Salterton Cricket Club.

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Above article posted on Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009

South West Communications Group scores top three finish for the Prince's Trust

South West Communications Group has claimed third place in a national race to raise the most money for the Prince’s Trust. The Exeter-based communications company had taken part in Million Makers. This is an annual drive that sees teams from across the UK compete against each other to raise the most money for the Prince’s Trust, which helps young people into work, while also enhancing team-work, leadership and communication skills.

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Above article posted on Wednesday, March 25th, 2009

South West Communications Group scoops Toshiba award for second year running

South West Communications Group has been named as Toshiba’s Technical Excellence Award recipient for the second year in a row. The winners of the annual awards have been announced by Toshiba BCD (Business Communications Division) with South West Communications Group coming out top with a score calculated on a combination of revenue spend, the number of technical support calls that were taken but not escalated, and the sophistication of the installations undertaken.

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Above article posted on Wednesday, March 11th, 2009