TAKING advantage of the latest technology, the Iloilo Provincial Government will subscribe to a system that will help reduce the telephone cost of offices situated in the Provincial Capitol.
The project refers to the internet protocol (IP) telephony communication system which the Information Communication Technology Management Office (ICTMO) procured from the PLDT Inc. to a tune of P1.7 million.
ICTMO chief Salvacion Sibonga said the adoption of this telephone system known as private branch exchange (PBX) is a cost-cutting measure that maximizes the use of Capitol’s fiber optic structured cabling system.
“In other words, we will forgo of some of our direct telephone lines and use the internet to exchange calls instead. This is an ICT best practice and it will become the future of telephony in Capitol,” said Sibonga.
PBX is a telephone system within an enterprise that switches calls between enterprise uses on local lines while allowing all users to share a certain number of external phone lines.
Capitol has 83 direct telephone lines and it is paying an average monthly telephone bill of P145, 000 or P1.7 million a year.
Switching to PBX will allow Capitol to maintain a maximum of 300 lines with a subscription fee of P30,000 per month or only P360,000 per year.
The use of IP telephony then will result to savings of about P1.3-million a year.
Capitol’s trunkline numbers and new local directory will be made public on May after the equipment and software are completely delivered and installed by the service provider.
The IP-PBX system has call forwarding, extension dialing and conferencing calling features. It is also capable of auto dialing, call blocking, call park, call pick-up, direct inward dialing, shared message boxes, and voice mail.
ICTMO will manage the telephone system as operator and the General Service Office will be responsible to subscribe to Integrated Services Digital Network to replace the existing analog phones.
But depending on the need of each office, one or two direct lines will be retained. (Jezza A. Nepomoceno)
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