For small businesses that rely on an open internet connection, there are some very great hosted VoIP services, meaning they do not control the entire connection to the switch. The quality of the customer’s ISP’s internet service and each network thereafter are something important where the quality of the service to these providers depends on. This is one type of the most residential VoIP services, and this service is for the small home office some provider’s offer an excellent quality business VoIP service. If you follow a few guidelines, you can make it easier by picking a good small business VoIP provider among the ones that offer a business product.

Ensure your network is in good shape

Your network is the first thing that you have control over. You have to make sure that it is in a good condition. Even the problems of simple network can affect the quality of VoIP calls. In this case, you can ensure that there is only one DHCP server/router in your place, your switches are in a good shape and your computers can be running efficiently.

It is not only bandwidth that is important.

The amount of bandwidth which is had by your internet connection, both on the upload and just an importantly on the download, is one of the first items that is addressed when looking at a hosted VoIP business phone service, but that also needs to be a steady connection. Make sure that it is enough to carry the number of simultaneous calls and each computer’s needs. The quality of your ISP’s internet connection is another important need. Your calls are going to suffer if there is packet loss, jitter or too much latency and it will not take much of those problems to degrade your conversations quickly. It means you need to ensure that your internet connection is stable and good.

The connection from you to your provider's switch

For information, this is unlikely that the connection that is received by VoIP provider’s switch from you will not cross several networks. You can get an advantage with the lower the amount of hops and the less latency to the VoIP provider’s switch. You can see how much the time it takes to get there and how many other routers you pass by doing a trace route and ping to their SIP server. Maybe you are interesting to do some testing on different times and different days of the day or evening.

The lowest price is not always the best service

This is just likely when getting bids for a project; a caution flag can be the one that is way under the others. When it comes to service, cheap is not always good. A provider that has a reasonable price with the competition, but not a low cost provider should be chosen.

Choose by features, service and presentation

The features are important for a small business phone solution. Remember how the information is presented when comparing features. You can get a good clue with the look and feel of a provider’s website as to the provider’s target customer base. It is just like a car; if you do a test drive without a lasting commitment is a valuable offer.