You Only Know if You Ask: 5 Key Questions To Ask Your SIP Trunk Provider

5 Key SIP Trunk Questions You Need to Ask Your Provider

Since SIP trunk calling is so popular, there’s no shortage of SIP providers who claim to give you the best service. This is why asking the right SIP trunk questions to a provider is essential for getting the right services for your needs.

5 Essential SIP Trunk Questions to Ask Providers

If you’re on the SIP search, make sure you ask these five important questions.

1. How Long Have You Been In Business?

A traditional telephone company may have a business history that stretches back decades, but SIP technology has only really been around since the mid-late ’90s.

The company you’re looking at to provide services may not have a long storied history, but you may want to go with someone that has a little more experience in the SIP world as opposed to a company that’s brand new.

You can’t ignore the benefits of having a little experience in the SIP world. There are a lot of new companies that are trying to cash in on being a SIP provider, but they may not be the best to handle your SIP needs.

A new company may not truly understand your SIP needs or know how to provide advanced services. They may only be able to give you the most basic services, and that could be problematic when and if your needs grow. 

2. Do You Use a Tier-One Carrier?

When you rely on SIP trunking for your communication needs, the last thing you want is a low-quality call. You’re going to want to go with a provider that can ensure that your calls will be sent and received with the utmost clarity.

One of the easiest ways to ensure that your calls will always be high quality is to go with Tier-1 voice carriers.

Try to find a SIP trunk provider that has at least one point of presence (POP) in each geographic area you’ll be calling the most. This can help dramatically improve call clarity and can help ensure low latency.

Try to stay away from companies that tout least cost touring (LCR) if you’re concerned about quality. You could end up saving money, but you’ll be sacrificing the quality of your calls for a few dollars.

3. What Technical Support Do You Provide?

If you switch to a SIP trunking system for your business, your main communication needs are going to rely on having a robust network. 

What would you do if you came in one morning and noticed that the entire network was down and you couldn’t make or receive calls? Do you know what would happen if you needed to rapidly expand your SIP needs? 

This is why it’s important to see what kind of technical support services your SIP provider has. You’ll want to have help in case there’s ever a problem. Go with a provider that has a robust support team you can contact whenever you need help. 

4. What Kind of Data Will I Have Access To?

Data plays an important role in every business in today’s modern world.

Every phone call a business makes can provide useful data that can help people in nearly every department, but traditional phone systems make it difficult to harvest all of that important information.

Call data records (CDRs) can be helpful when you’re trying to understand your true communication needs.

It can also give you an accurate portrait of your business activities in terms of call volume and length. This data can be especially useful when you’re looking into ways to improve sales and customer service.

If you go with a data-savvy SIP provider, you’ll have easy access to all of your CDRs through a specialized control panel. You’ll be able to view records of all of your calls and download them into CSV files.

5. Can You Offer Automated Provisioning?

The business world can change rapidly, and your communication needs can change right alongside with it. Finding a SIP provider that offers automated provisioning can ensure that you’re getting your communication needs met at any time.

You may find that you need to rapidly add new channels to keep up with communication demands. It’s also possible that you may have overestimated your needs and could manage to have fewer lines.

A SIP service that offers automated provisioning can make it easy for you to add or reduce communication channels at a moment’s notice.

You won’t have to wait for an order to go through or to have someone change your account information. You’ll be able to make changes at the touch of a button.

Get Started Today

Now that you know how to ask the right SIP trunk questions, it’s time to find the answers you’ll need to choose the right provider for your needs.

We’re always here to answer any questions you may have about SIP services, and want to help you get the communication help you’ve always wanted.

Contact us today so we can start thinking about the best ways to meet your SIP needs.