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Cloud phone system for a Quebec SME: the trade
What a cloud phone system replaces, what it does not, what it costs you the day the internet drops, and the Quebec questions no French comparison asks.
John · Owner and CEO · 2 min read · · updated
A cloud phone system replaces the box on the wall with a service you configure in a browser. Calls travel over your internet connection. What changes for a Quebec SME is not mainly price: it is that configuration stops being a technician's visit.
What goes away
Hardware first: no switch to house, cool and keep patched. Then (and this is the real gain) the delay between wanting a change and having it.
Two rows are the gain, one is the cost, and the last is the question a Quebec buyer has to ask before signing.
Reuse this figure anywhere, including commercially, with credit to Ringfully and a link back to this page. CC BY 4.0.
Editing a menu, adding an extension, changing business hours before a holiday: on an on-premise system each of those is a service ticket. On a cloud system it is a screen. The difference is measured in days, not dollars.
What does not go away
Your internet connection becomes your phone line. If it drops, the phone drops. That is the real trade, and it is manageable: a cellular backup, or automatic forwarding to mobiles when the office stops answering. Does VoIP work without internet weighs those options against each other.
Nor does the rest. Somebody still has to decide who answers what, when, and in which language. A cloud system carries out your decisions faster; it makes none of them. Fraud does not go away either: an old login dialling abroad overnight is the surprise phone bill, and the answer is a ceiling, not vigilance.
Three questions French-language comparisons do not ask
Almost all French-language writing on this subject comes from France. It is often good, and all of Quebec is missing from it. Three questions go unasked, and all three have Quebec answers.
Where does the data live?
Law 25 requires a privacy impact assessment before personal information is communicated outside Quebec. Recordings and call logs are personal information. Almost every cloud provider triggers that obligation and almost none mention it: the detail is here.
What language does the system answer in?
Your telephone greeting falls under the Charter if you serve the public in Quebec. That is not a configuration preference, it is an obligation. See Law 96 and your phone system.
Which area code?
A 418 does not say the same thing as a 514 to a customer in Lévis. See Quebec's area codes.
What we do, and what we do not
Ringfully is a cloud phone system: browser and Windows softphones, a visual call-flow builder, skills-based queues, call recording. What it does is the short version of the list. Our data is in AWS us-east-1, in the United States, stated plainly rather than described as "the cloud".
What we do not have: the softphones are Windows desktop and browser only, there is nothing for a phone, and there is no self-serve signup. We set your numbers, hours and routing up with you.
We are not yet incorporated, which is written on every policy page rather than implied.
Questions people ask
- What is a cloud phone system?
- A phone service you configure in a browser instead of a box on the wall, with calls travelling over your internet connection. For a small business the main change is not the price: editing a menu, adding an extension or changing hours before a holiday stops being a service ticket and becomes a screen.
- What happens to my phones if the internet goes down?
- They go down with it. That is the real trade of putting calls on your internet connection, and it is manageable rather than fatal: a cellular backup, or automatic forwarding to cell phones when the office stops answering. Decide which one you want before you need it.
- Where does a cloud phone provider keep my call data?
- Ask, and get the answer in writing. Law 25 requires a privacy impact assessment before personal information is communicated outside Quebec, and call recordings and call logs are personal information. Ringfully's data is in AWS us-east-1, in the United States. Almost every cloud provider triggers that obligation and almost none mention it.
- Is there an application for my cell phone?
- No. The softphones are a browser tab and a Windows desktop application, and there is nothing for a cell phone. If your team answers from the road, forwarding a call to a cell phone is how that is handled today.
- Can I sign myself up for a cloud phone system?
- Not here. There is no self-serve signup: numbers, hours and routing are set up with you in a conversation. That is slower to start, and it means the first call goes out on a system somebody has actually checked.
About the author
John
Owner and CEO
Owner and CEO with over 10 years of experience in the IT industry, including more than 5 years specializing in VoIP and cloud communications. Experienced in designing, deploying, and supporting reliable communication solutions for businesses.
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