Last March, Franklin Machine Products, Lumberton, a global distributor of restaurant equipment and parts, realized it needed help with keeping on top of the hundreds of phone calls it received daily. For years, the company had a receptionist to answer incoming calls before routing them to one of 50 sales and service agents in the company’s call center. As Franklin grew, maintaining that personal touch became a greater challenge: the receptionist would have to answer the estimated 1,500 calls per day.

So Franklin Machine turned to Basking Ridge-based Avaya for its IP Office 412 solution. “Before we installed IP Office, our operator console could handle only 10 incoming calls at a time,” says Bob Fisher, director of information technology for Franklin Machine. “Once 10 callers were in queue, the customer would hear the phone ring, but the call couldn’t be answered. We have no idea how many calls were missed because the system simply couldn’t handle them.”

Avaya’s IP Office 412 — which includes new, upgraded hardware that expands the product’s capacity by more than one third — supports from two to 256 users, allowing Avaya to deliver the business benefits of IP telephony to Franklin and other small- to midsized firms around the globe. The system for Franklin was sold and installed by PhoneXtra, a New Jersey-based Avaya Gold-certified BusinessPartner.

With Franklin’s Avaya IP Office system, any call that isn’t answered right away is sent to an automated attendant. Customers can choose to wait in queue to speak with Franklin’s receptionist, leave a message or speak with another member of the team. In addition, a second console has been added, allowing any of the company’s call center agents to log in and assist the receptionist on particularly busy days.

On choosing Avaya’s system, Fisher says, “We wanted a system that would allow us…