On-Prem PBX replacement with 3CX VoIP

The firm had been running on a Panasonic KX-NS700 on-premises PBX for the best part of a decade. It had served its purpose when everyone was in the office five days a week, but by the time they came to us it was showing its age in several ways. First, BT's ISDN switch-off was approaching. Second, and more immediately frustrating for the business, the system had none of the features their staff now expected as standard: no call recording, no call queuing, no hunt groups that worked reliably, no voicemail-to-email, and absolutely no way for remote or hybrid workers to receive or make calls through the office system. Staff working from home were either giving clients their personal mobile numbers or missing calls entirely.

WHAT WE DID

We recommended 3CX hosted on a cloud instance rather than another on-premises box. The case was straightforward: lower upfront cost, no hardware to maintain, software updates handled automatically, and every feature the team had been missing available out of the box. We provisioned a 3CX instance on a VPS hosted in a UK datacentre, sized appropriately for 20 simultaneous users, and ported their existing DDI numbers across to a VoIPcloud SIP trunk,preserving all their published numbers without any gap in service.

The configuration took the bulk of the time. We set up individual extensions for all 20 users, created ring groups for the main reception number and each department, and configured a call queue for their client services line with position announcements and a configurable overflow to voicemail after 90 seconds. Voicemail-to-email was enabled for every extension, with recordings delivered as MP3 attachments to each user's inbox. Call recording was switched on for all inbound and outbound calls on the client services queue, with recordings stored on the 3CX instance and accessible through the management console.

For remote workers, we deployed the 3CX desktop app on Windows laptops and the mobile app on iOS and Android. Every member of staff could now make and receive calls through their office DDI from anywhere, with the same call handling rules applying whether they were at their desk or working from home. We also set up a basic auto-attendant for out-of-hours calls with a recorded greeting and option to leave a voicemail or reach an on-call number. The old Panasonic PBX was decommissioned the following Monday morning. 

SERVICES INVOLVED

• 3CX VoIP Deployment
• SIP Trunking
• PBX Migration
• Telecoms Consultancy

Why now, not later. BT's ISDN and PSTN switch-off is forcing every UK business still on a legacy PBX to make this move regardless,the only choice left is whether it happens on your terms or in an emergency. A cloud PBX like 3CX runs over your existing internet connection, extends to mobile and desktop apps for remote and hybrid staff, and gives you features like call recording, queues, voicemail-to-email that older Panasonic, Avaya, and similar on-premise systems were never built for.

What to check before you migrate. Number porting, call quality on your current internet connection, and integration with whatever CRM or helpdesk system you already run are the three things that make or break a PBX replacement. Get those right up front and a full office of 20+ extensions can move over a single weekend with zero missed calls, the same way this one did.

See more on our VoIP Solutions.