Virtual Contact Center by 8x8 Software

Pros

The app on the computer is great. Shows me calls coming in to different extensions. I am able to fax right from my computer with is amazing!!

Cons

The only con is not with the software itself. Customer support is can be a little difficult. Some of them understand others do not.

Would love for the app to be optimized.

Pros

Really like the convenience of being able to take my office phone with me where ever I am. Useful in that aspect.

Cons

The app is very buggy. It goes offline after each call and if you don't restart the app, the next call that comes in will freeze on the screen. I've also noticed that the calls that come through on the app are delayed. The phone will ring twice in the office before my cell phone rings which causes a lot of missed calls if I'm not able to answer right away. Especially if the app doesn't respond quick enough.

Pros

easy to use as plug and play. can easily set up voicemails. can log in remotely even if outside the network

Cons

very limited features compared to Fonality. Does not have hud software where you can easily chat with other colleagues.

Pros

We use 8x8 for our office and we typically don't experience issues with our in office phones. The service is pretty reliable for in office phones.

Cons

The mobile app is SO glitchy. There is a large delay from when a call is received in office versus when it starts ringing from the mobile app. It causes a lot of our calls to be missed. Sometimes, the app won't open fully in order for us to hit the answer button. It will freeze a lot and requires a lot of forcing close and reopening the app so it will function properly.

This product offers pretty much everything you'd expect from a high-end VoIP without the high-end price, including call recording and faxing. For most the faxing functionality is just a "nice to have" but for us, it was a feature we were specifically looking for. It also integrates with Salesforce and Microsoft Outlook, so old timers in the office will be more comfortable using it over some of the other VoIP options out there.

Cons

Not to be particular, but the interface is pretty ugly and clunky. Think login web portals in the mid-2000s.

I am with a Non-Profit Organization and started to use 8x8 after dealing with a very old phone system. All I can say that is that we get great customer support, great service, up to date technology and best of all very affordable. I definitely recommend this company to anyone.

Pros

Up to date technology, great customer service, very affordable, many options to keep in communication with your clients and customers.

Cons

None that I can think.

Advice to Others

8x8 is truly a great solution for small business and large business.

Switched to 8x8 from another popular VOIP system, due to profit loss issues with other system, and great recommendations from trustworthy business connections. I overall love the experience and the system, how easy it is to use and navigate. However it was a bit overwhelming at first, you get used to how its used fairly fast! If you need help from customer service though, be careful it could become a headache and a lot of wasted time and frustration really quickly!

As a manager for an inbound tech support call center, 8x8 did a decent job accomplishing most of what we needed. It allowed us to answer calls, manage queue schedules and priorities, etc. The agent interface was easy to use, but the admin interface was fairly difficult and required some sort of a programming background to make full use of it. The biggest problem with 8x8 is its lack of features such as: automated reporting and live metric dashboards. Also, the email client was difficult to use and was very glitchy sometimes resulting in losing emails. The customer service was also below par. Most of the times that I called in, the agent on the other side, did not know the answer and took way too much time to get back to me (if they did). In a span of 6 months, I was assigned 3 different customer success managers making it confusing on who my go-to person was. We eventually stopped using 8x8 and went with a newer competitor that was in front of the pack in terms of features and quality.

Pros

It's a cloud solution allowing you to employ remote call center agents

Cons

The worst part was the lack of support especially when things were down. Most of my agents used the word 'hate' when it came to the email interface.

Advice to Others

Seek out newer solutions which use apps making it easier to integrate with your CRM and other tools you may use. Also, try to find a solution which combines everything you need in it, such as ticketing, self-help sites (forum/FAQs/Etc), chat, and more.

Why do I like this company? Not only do I like this company I have a great relationship with working from my office phones and using this wonderful broadband phone company. Now wait, no landlines in my office. No landlines. I was able to work with this team and duplicate my office phones and place them in my home as well. I do a lot of cloud technology for our Dental office and it is important to have a phone system that can pull the load.

I love the fact that I have an automated attendant that can play any message I record on it. I can custom fit it to our office and place any message I want our patients to hear. Now lets get down to the flexibility of this phone system. Ready?

I can answer calls from a phone, on the computer, on an app on my cell phone anywhere. This company has the ability to track any call that comes in. If a patient does not leave a message I can still get in touch with them to help them out. New people calling in also can get a call back even if they do not leave a message. Now you say if you had a big staff you would not need to have to call them back you would answer the phone. True, but I save on staff salary, and possible lack of staff motivation this way. I roll the money back into the practice. If I am doing office work in another location and it is after hours I am still able to monitor the calls and call them right back. If it is an emergency they can get scheduled very quickly.

The team at 8x8.com can customize your phone needs for any size office. They were able to help me out when I needed a fax machine very quickly lets, say in the next two hours. I still remember that day that I called my sales rep out in the West Coast about 6:30 am and he went far and beyond to help our company set up a broadband fax machine. He grabbed his coffee and within 2 hours my fax machine was up and running. This helped our patient with keeping an appointment that they need to go to and not have to reschedule. The office that sprang the surprise on us was quick to note how fast our team came threw. 8X8.com is part of our team because I feel that we are on the same team.

You will not get a better team working for you when it comes to your phone needs. This team is BAA compliant for medical and dental offices. Also not just medical and dental but for insurance companies, accountants and many other offices that fit into HIPPA compliance. Love working with their technology team when I need to change anything on my phone system. These guys are great to work with and I guess that is why we have been going strong with them now since 2014.

Pros

The 8x8 team is the best. Great technology and great customer support!

Cons

Our office has been with 8x8 from February of 2014 and has had no reason to change to another company.

Advice to Others

This team will save your company time and money. They are well worth having them join your office and working with them continues to be a great joy!

When I signed up for 8x8 my company was in the process of moving all of their employees to one centralized office. As soon as we signed our lease I began signing up for services such as 8x8. Initially, I really liked 8x8. Their reviews were solid, my account manager was friendly and I thought I'd made the right choice. Unfortunately, when it came time to set up all of our phones, I felt mislead. I was told it would take approximately 10 minutes to get each phone up and running. It's been about a month now and our phones still cannot receive incoming calls. 8x8 has diagnosed the problem as an systematic malfunction with our (and all) Gateway router. I am dissatisfied because we had subscribed to 8x8 before we chose our router. If I knew this, we might have purchased a different router. I believe we'll be able to solve this issue once we've picked the IT company we'd like to outsource this to but this problem is going to end up costing countless dollars and man-hours. I feel like it was avoidable.

Pros

Price, domestic customer service, features.

Cons

Lack of transparency about their systems limitation.

Advice to Others

Don't chose this service if you have a Gateway router.

Likes Best

The ability to answer calls through your deskphone, cellphone, and computer. Also, the free long distance to the UK, Europe and other countries on their list.

Likes Least

Call back with an engineer can take a while (hours, if not a day). The quick service you get during setup is not the same service you will get onces you're done with your setup.

Recommendations

Please be aware that there are VOIP settings that need to be configured on your end in order to make sure that call quality is consistent. Also, dated equipment, such as routers and switches may be an issue with this, but the settings and older equipment (7 to 10 yrs old in my case) may be an issue for any VOIP service that you choose and not limited to 8x8.

Likes Best

8x8 is a very efficient and reasonably priced solution for Call Centers. They have everything you need in one place. 8x8 helps me run my business more smoothly than any other services I have used before. It's very easy to setup and use and help is there when you need it.

Likes Least

I can honestly say that I have nothing that I am unimpressed with with this company. So far they have lived up to their standards.

Recommendations

Use this software to the fullest. Use every aspect of it.

Likes Best

Easy to use. . Intuitive. Great support when you need it.

Likes Least

Pretty straightforward ..hard to pick an area for improvement.

Recommendations

Making sure your staff get trained on how to use it to take advantage of the efficiencies it offers.

Likes Best

Its a Virtual phone service, that way can accessed from anywhere with a phone app and laptop.

Likes Least

Very bad connectivity. We have a decent internet connection and we still have call drops or loss of connection. if not that call will echo.

Recommendations

Check with the sales rep. About all features and costing as they tend to over sell things and not mention about additional cost.
try to see if you can use it for trial period for a week.

Likes Best

Provides unique features. We really like the consistency of the service and the texting feature is very useful for our business when it works.

Likes Least

We've have had issues with the texting. We rely pretty heavily on that feature and it shut down on us 3 times and we were unable to get it working again. Customer support could not figure out the issues either.

Recommendations

Consistent service with little to no interruption other than the texting.

Likes Best

Virtual office provides so much value for my company. At first, I thought it may be out of my price range but once I started it up and tried it out, I realized it's a steal for everything they offer.
Not only does the Virtual Contact Center work as a medium between the customer and whoever can get to the phones at that time, it frees up so much of the middle-man work and the cost I would be spending on someone to be a greeter can go to more lucrative programs.
The Contact Center sure is valuable, but the real value comes from the Virtual meetings office software. I say this because my team does a lot of off-site work as well as hiring freelancers for shorter jobs. Being able to meet with a whole room of people in any country and time-zone is so valuable for my business!

Likes Least

Like I described in the top paragraph, I initially had doubts about the cost. These doubts were crushed when I saw all of the value that this product adds, however it could always be cheaper.
The only other qualm I have is that it definitely seems to be more positioned to larger companies. I have a smaller business with fluctuating team sizes so Virtual Office isn't quite as agile as my team.

Recommendations

Virtual office provides a suite of valuable features for just about any business. But they do certain things very well for medium sized businesses. Make sure your business size and vision are aligned with the features that Virtual Office offers; if your are aligned then you'll have a great product, if you're not aligned, you'll still have a great product, but one you'll be paying too much for the features you need.

Likes Best

This product is user friendly. I was able to start using it successfully with little training.

Likes Least

Sometimes I do not get the info of when the message was left so I'm not sure how old the message is.

Recommendations

make sure it has all the functions necessary like rewind, skip, and pause when listening to messages

Likes Best

What I liked about this product is that I am notified via email about voicemail messages. I often neglect the blinking light on my actual office phone due to not knowing if the voicemail is specifically for me or for another department.

Likes Least

Not quite sure how fast the email notification come in after voicemail has been received.

Recommendations

Definitely will recommend to have email notification on real time when the voice mail messages are left. Pause feature while listening to voice mail message will help as well.

Likes Best

Virtual Office by 8x8 definitely delivers a lot of value in the product as well as resources outside of the the system alone.
This includes an 8x8 academy that teaches basic users all the way to admins how to set up and run the platform so there's never a question. This was a brilliant move on their part as i'm sure it cuts down on all of the smaller businesses like me going to contact their support team for help.

Likes Least

I didn't have this system for long because I felt like I was nickel and dimed the whole way through it. While they have every service I would need in a traditional PBX, and at a much cheaper price than a traditional price, I've found other SaaS offer pretty much the same product at a better value for the small team I have.
I've noticed a couple of other services I've tried are fairly plug-in-play, meaning quick and easy setup with straightforward prompts to get you going in no time. With a service this large and comprehensive, I don't blame them for this, but it wasn't necessarily a fit for my team's needs.

Recommendations

I could see 8x8's product being much more valuable to larger teams who have bigger needs regarding training and the support they have to offer. If you don't require a lot of the background services they have to offer, then you'll be paying a premium for a product you're not using entirely.

Likes Best

The helped with setup with all questions that we had. Ease of use with mobile handsets, real phones, or "phones" using your computer.

Likes Least

Dependent on internet connection. If your internet connection is slow, this may not be the solution/program for you.

Recommendations

If you need HIPAA compliant phone system and voicemail storage, make sure that you ask about HIPAA compliance and what settings you need to use to be complaint.