Cloud Voice Express vs Cloud Phone

[charles66]

Can someone please explain to me the main differences between BT Cloud Voice Express and Cloud Phone? They seem very similar: both claim to be cloud-based phone systems for small businesses and both can make calls via mobile apps and deskphones. What am I missing? Thanks.

[AdamC]

Hi,

Cloud Voice Express is designed as a single line service. 1 call at a time in or out.

Cloud Phone is a phone system and can handle multiple calls on 1 number at the same time.

Further Cloud Phone will have features which are not accessible on cloud voice express.

Thank you,

Adam

[charles66]

Thanks Adam, that makes sense - I have spent several hours reading up about it on both the BT website and elsewhere and that hasn't been clear anywhere.

We are a small office of four people. We use mobiles for outgoing calls. Not many incoming calls so we currently have a single BT line (and broadband). We have a small Gigaset cordless phone system which lets us transfer the incoming calls between users.

Am I right in thinking that if I get Standard Fibre 76 Essential + Digital Line (which comes with a single CVE line) and a Poly OBi302 ATA, I can plug my Gigaset into the ATA and the phones should continue to work in the same way as they do now? Thanks.

[charles66]

In my previous post I specified the Poly OBi302 ATA but I think BT might be supplying a different one now. I mean will it work with whichever ATA BT are supplying at the moment? Thanks.

[BethM]

Hi charles66

Provided your analogue device can connect to your ATA, I don't see any reason this wouldn't work. 

[charles66]

Hi BethM

Thanks for your reply. I agree that it should work (it would work with any other VOIP system), but I haven't seen anything on the BT website or pdf documents that explicitly says it will work with analogue phones on CVE.

If you look at the 'How to use analogue devices with Cloud Voice Express' section of the page I've linked below, it talks about using the ATA to connect Tills, EPOS, Oyster, Fax machines and Other non-voice Services:

https://business.bt.com/help/guides/fibre-and-digital-line-bundle/using-your-cloud-voice-express-pho...

Why does it specify non-voice?

There's also a link in that page to Set up an analogue phone adaptor. Again, if you read that page there's no explicit mention of connecting an analogue phone (despite calling it an analogue phone adapter). It talks about Caller ID devices, faxes and door bells and has a diagram that shows a legacy bell ringer, a legacy till with Caller ID and a legacy fax - but no phones. Please can you confirm that the BT supplied ATAs do work with analogue phones and haven't been modified in some way to prevent it.

Thanks very much.

 

[BethM]

Hi charles66

I will reach out to the CVE specialists to clarify and reply back to you once I have an answer. 

[BethM]

Hi Charles66

The replacement service for Analogue Voice handsets is Cloud Voice Express with W73P base station & Handset plus additional W73H multiple handsets.

This will allow you to transfer incoming calls around your business and is our recommended solution.

An ATA (Cisco 191) is supplied reactively via the CV Express support desk. This is provided on a best endeavours basis to help customers whose historic way of working is no longer available to them.  BT does not guarantee it to work with any analogue devices.  This is only available to existing Cloud Voice customers.

The Cisco 191 is currently being trialled in our sales channels. 

[charles66]

BethM

Thank you for this information. It's great to have someone at BT who is as helpful and responsive as you. Well done, and keep it up!

The following comment is aimed at your employer, not you.

It does seem that BT are trying to pull a bit of a fast one with small business customers by changing the pricing model and pushing them towards paying for each phone in the building, rather than each external phone line. Cloud Phone, Cloud Voice and Cloud Voice Express are all priced this way. They seem to be making it difficult to connect an existing small phone system (eg. Gigaset type cordless) to a single line, as you can with Digital Voice - but that's not available to business customers. Using an ATA on a single CVE line would achieve a similar result. Instead small businesses are being pushed towards taking out multiple (in our case four) Cloud Phone (if you want to transfer calls) lines at £16-£19 per month each (depending how long you contract for),  plus buy new phones - only from BT - to achieve no more than we had before. We don't need the extra bits that come with Cloud Phone, so why should we have to pay for it? Why should we pay more, just because we happen to have four phones in the building even though there'll never be more than one making 'external' calls? Maybe if I push hard enough I'll be able to get an ATA, and get it working. But claiming it's only suitable for 'non-voice services' in the marketing blurb suggests to me that BT are hoping small businesses will just go ahead and order (and pay for) the extra lines.

Trebles all round in the BT directors' dining room no doubt!