ACE Network: Making Voice Calls Easier with Cisco Unified Mobility Single Number Reach

I use my desk phone only about once a day, but most callers still reach me on their first try. How is this possible? With Cisco Unified Mobility: Single Number Reach (SNR), a feature that allows me to control how incoming calls are sent to my desk, mobile, or soft phones.

Although this SNR feature has been supported on Cisco Unified Communications Manager for many years, recent versions that we’ve been testing on the Cisco ACE network extend it to all of the phones and video endpoints I use in my work.

Most ACE network users are salespeople, so SNR is a great tool for helping them stay in touch, especially when traveling, working away from the office or during the holidays. With this in mind, we conducted a study that showed that Cisco could potentially gain the value of more than US $130 million per year from improved productivity by adopting SNR — and that is only taking salespeople into account!

When I’m in the office, SNR first rings my office phone and if I don’t answer it, then it rings my mobile phone, my personal TelePresence EX60, then my Jabber Video for TelePresence (Movi). If I still can’t answer the call, it is routed to my mobile phone, although I could choose to send all voicemail to my Cisco Unity mailbox. It is significantly convenient when I’m traveling as calls are sent directly to my mobile phone, which avoids the need to ring multiple endpoints.

Currently, only users on the ACE network can use the feature of dual ring to their desk phone and Cisco Jabber video. For Cisco IT, the integration of Cisco Unified Mobility: SNR with the video infrastructure eliminates the need to have separate phone numbers assigned to a user’s Cisco Jabber video endpoint.

I also appreciate the privacy value of giving my contacts only a single business phone number, instead of a business card that includes my personal home or mobile numbers. The more endpoints you have, the harder it is for someone to know where to find you, so a single number saves time and avoids confusion when someone wants to reach me right away.

Users are expected to setup their own SNR configuration, but they can find instructions and user guides in the ACE area of the internal Cisco WebEx Social sharing site. The feature is also covered in the training for new ACE network users.

Getting Through at the Right Time

You can’t always know when you’ll get an important call. And sometimes, having even just a few minutes to connect with a customer can make a difference. Cisco Unified Mobility: SNR lets me do this and it works so seamlessly I don’t even think about how the call was able to reach me. That’s the experience we want all users to have.

This post is part of a series about the Cisco IT ACE Service Introduction Network. You’ll find more information in these related posts:

ACE Network: Cisco IT Supports a Network for Introducing New Services

ACE Network: Experience the Newly Improved Cisco Jabber Universal Client

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