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I am at my wit's end (not a long trip) and need to figure out an alternative to a Verizon Centrex account.

I was told by VZ that they no longer accept telephone calls for moves & changes, or for repair requests. Only email. So, I emailed them three days ago, and of course, since no one particular person is responsible to answer and respond to emails, the messages just sit in limbo.

My customer is a local government with 30 or so Centrex lines, spread over several buildings on one campus, and one other building that is a mile away. The key system is a Toshiba which they like, and the company who maintains it is OK. I am the person who maintains all the voice, data, and security wiring, and deals with the Verizon morons.

Optimum Voice does not offer Centrex, only POTS.

I need a CLEC who either has a co-location presence in a VZ C.O., or a CLEC that can provide its own version of Centrex COS.

I want to feed my sub with a T-1 line for the main location, and use a VOIP application for the other location. (It has only 4 lines there)

We're located on Long Island. We need the name of a good dial tone supplier who can offer Centrex-type service.

Arthur, have you tried Primus?

No, these guys?

these guys?

Clicking their "CONTACT" page, there is a drop-down that lists their applications:

Long Distance/Wireless and DSL are the only applications they list for the Americas.

Business Services : 1.866.385.3360

Click on the top tab "Business Services"

* Local, long distance and international voice services
* High speed Internet access
* Hosted PBX services
* Converged voice and data T-1 services
* Enterprise VoIP services

I've used Primus (Canada) for my lines for at least 5 years. Never had a problem.

"I was told by VZ that they no longer accept telephone calls for moves & changes"
You have got to be kidding me!

Arthur:

I'm pretty sure that Frontier and XO have POP in most COs on Long Island. I know that Frontier used to offer Centrex because I have a customer at the Amtrak facility on LI that used them for the same thing you're looking to do.

Ed, (and you'all other guys) thank you for the help.

I will look at them again, and I have sent them an email request for a tele-conference.

I will also look into Frontier's offerings. I wasn't sure if Centrex is/was a proprietary COS or whether the concept is in the public domain.

Jeff, no, I am not making that up. By diverting telephone calls away from their call centers, they accomplish what most large robber baron companies do: The eliminate the union workers , and can delay answering questions and requests for days or even for ever, such as in my case. It's a brilliant plan.

VZ may have a dedicated team for local government.

AT&T has GEM - Government, Education and Medical. You submit requests via email and get an immediate automated response with a ticket number. Orders are written within two business days, and a due date generated.

It’s all done via email, but when the order is written, the name and contact info of a real person is provided. I’ve actually grown to like the procedure.

That sounds like a well-thought out plan. In my case, I have not been assigned a rep to handle our govt account, therefore, any email I send goes to no one in particular. When I asked, during my last phone call, who my rep would be, they said, just send an email, and someone will be assigned. What a joke.

I sent a detailed message to Prius, and here's the result. Email undeliverable:

-------------------------------

This report relates to a message you sent with the following header fields:

Message-id: <313DFC231DED47548F65F888D808E9E6@dtsr9173hez6t6>
Date: Thu, 16 Dec 2010 18:37:34 -0500
From: "Arthur P. Bloom" <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Sales inquiry

Your message is being returned; it has been enqueued and undeliverable for
53 hours to the following recipients:

Recipient address: [email protected]
Reason: unable to deliver this message after 53 hours

Arthur -

Re Centrex being a proprietary product.

On the ATT switch (1ESS? 5ESS?) the final entry in the programming string was CTX - Centrex.

On the GTE 4600 the final entry was CXL, which My manual explained was "Centrex Line".

Any reputable carrier should be able to provide you with Centrex services.

Sam

Sam:

You're right, of course. I have had extended (painful) conversations with Optimum Voice out here on the Island. I have spoken with people all the way up their chain of command, and they either haven't a clue about Centrex-like services, or they know what I'm talking about, but insist that their switch cannot provide that service.

I have tried to convince them to do the programming, but they just will not do it. I have tried to explain how many customer lines they could pick up from VZ, but they refuse to listen.

So, as suggested, I will try some other CLEC who has a presence out this way, and hopefully we will get a T-1 and get away from VZ.

In the grand scheme of things, what you are seeking (while we often refer to these features as 'Centrex'), is a service provider who's serving switch has the capability to provide the call transfer feature. Frankly, I don't know of any central office-class switch that lacks such capabilities. That feature dates way back to the days of even some of the earliest mechanical switches!

Sure, 'Centrex' adds a few more bells and whistles, but I've yet to see any situation at government level where those perks are expected or even utilized. CFBNA is about all that I ever see used and that is at the grand Washington, DC level.

The sad reality is that we aren't speaking of the capabilities of the actual switch. We are fighting the battle of getting through to someone at the sales level who actually understands what you are seeking and how they can convey your request to the appropriate parties at the switch level.

Therein lies the problem.

May God be with you in your venture, Arthur.

Centrex services no longer exist in our neck of the woods, existing centrex customers were made aware of this almost two years ago. Out with the old in with the new.
Not sure what the beef is here???

PS,
Your solution is SIP , VOIP or more than likely a combination of both.

PSS
Love that Centrex went south, opportunities when this happened was great.

Maybe things will improve since Frontier has acquired Verizon land line business. Or maybe not.

Frontier aquired certain parts of Verizon's land line business. In New England, Verizon is still the RBOC for Massachusetts & Rhode Island.