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Good Call: This App Let's Virtual Teams Stay Connected This app lets you have multiple business lines and features in your pocket.

By David Port

This story appears in the May 2016 issue of Entrepreneur. Subscribe »

Maggie Shannon
Ahmed Khattak

Early last year, Ahmed Khattak launched US Mobile, a provider of no-contract, no-frills cellphone service aimed at college students, seniors and other low-usage customers. And yet, he struggled to find a good phone system for in-house staff at his Connecticut headquarters. "You would think we would have had that covered, since we are a telecom company," he says with a chuckle. But it was truly hard going: Hardware-based and VOIP options were too inflexible, and he was facing the prospect of wasting hundreds of thousands of dollars to make his current in-house system work for his growing company.

Meanwhile, he had a business with no reliable way to expand customer support or pull analytics.

The Fix

After months of searching, Khattak discovered Aircall, a Paris, France-based company that offers a unique telecom solution: Its app can be downloaded on any device -- an employee's cellphone, a company computer or tablet and more -- that instantly links into a central system. Each device even gets its own new phone extension. Khattak set up the system with on-demand features such as call cascading (which moves an incoming call to the next available person), call forwarding and recording, a button on his website that allows customers to call via their computers and more.

Results

"It literally took a half hour to set up everything," Khattak says, "and the built-in systems and service and support have been phenomenal." His 20-person support team is now seamlessly linked. Aircall's dashboard-based analytics -- with metrics on hold times, individual agent productivity and so on -- have also helped US Mobile improve its customer service, Khattak says. Reps now successfully handle 25 percent more calls a day. Aircall charges a monthly per-user fee ranging from $10 to $40 per device, depending on the package, and US Mobile is paying less than $500 a month -- a "massive" savings, Khattak says.

Second Opinion

A system like this may be great, but it's not for everyone, says Ari Santiago, founder of the West Hartford, Conn.-based telecom consulting firm IT Direct. For reliability and compliance -- depending upon your industry -- you may still need to have a dedicated computer and phone line to handle customer service calls. And even if you don't, he says, "I'd be wary of making staff dependent on a single device, such as their personal computer or their personal smartphone, for handling important business and customer calls." His recommendation: Conduct a serious analysis of all the service options. Then make the call.

David Port

Entrepreneur Contributor

David Port is a freelancer based in Denver who writes on small business, and financial and energy issues.

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