Telecom For Dummies

There are only a handful of people you want on the call while you are activating a circuit. These people can be grouped into two categories: the people you must have and the people you may need. Of course, there’s also a third category — the people you definitely do not want. Check out the following sections for more information on which people are in each group.

Getting your A-list together: Mandatory participants in your activation party

Here’s a list of people who must be present when you activate your toll-free dedicated circuit:

• Your carrier’s installation technician: Your carrier has to individually activate every DS-3, DS-1, and lower-level DS-0 on your circuit. If the technician doesn’t show up, all bets are off; you can’t install the circuit.

• A technician from your hardware vendor: You must have someone technically capable on your end to validate settings on your hardware and to perform simple testing. If you do not have a hardware vendor, hire one for this event. An installation tech that can bring your circuits up without any problem is well worth the investment.

• You: Someone needs to write down everything that happens during the installation. That someone is you, unless you can think of someone more trustworthy and knowledgeable than you (in that case, I still think you should be there, along with this other ace). You won’t be activating any circuits. You’re there to witness and record all the vital information about the birth of your beautiful new dedicated circuit. Bring a pen and paper (see “Writing an Installation Journal,” later in this chapter), and record the name of the technicians present, along with the general sequence of events. Try to make your notes as specific as possible without going overboard.

   Remember  I suppose you could sit in your office instead of being present for this technical achievement, but it’s really not a good idea. For one thing, if you are not involved in the installation, there may be very little motivation to successfully complete it. For another thing, you may actually be useful. And finally, you could save your company a lot of money by being there. Your hardware vendor is probably charging you by the hour, so even though he has other work to do he’s not necessarily going to work at breakneck speed. Likewise, the technician at your carrier may not feel the need to push through simple issues without proper motivation. Issues that have financial implications can come up during an installation process. The only way to avoid being told that the installation went fine, and then realizing a month later (when the bill arrives) that something costly has occurred, is to be there when it happens. Say your hardware vendor changes the configuration on the five T-1s you installed from loopstart to ISDN. Although this change enables additional information to be transmitted in the call stream (which may be useful for your business), it may also cause you to incur additional charges. If you’re not there to say “Heck, no,” your carrier may charge you $250 for the change, $250 apiece to install the five D channel cards, and $150 per month for the cards. The installation technician can’t waive those fees, and you will have a difficult time renegotiating the price with your salesperson on a feature that has already been installed.

• Your local carrier’s installation technician: If you ordered a local loop (see Chapter 8), you’re responsible for coordinating the testing between your long-distance carrier and your local carrier. If your long-distance carrier ordered the local loop, don’t worry, the long-distance carrier will have already done its testing before even allowing you to schedule the installation.

 Remember  Do not try to install new circuits on new hardware yourself. Unless you are comfortable enough with your phone system and can confidently configure, test, and confirm settings within it, you need to hire someone who can. Every phone system’s configurations are set up a bit differently; some have dip switches, some require you to use a laptop to connect into them, and some can be set by prompts given on an LCD screen on the face of the unit. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you could to waste four or five hours figuring things out through trial and error.

Bringing in the B-list: Optional guests

Here’s a list of people who you should welcome to your installation party. If these people are there, they can make things go smoothly if something goes wrong. But if they regretfully decline to attend, you shouldn’t hold up the installation process on their account. Invite the following people with fingers crossed:

• A rep from your carrier, specifically, the person who handled your order: If there is a problem during the installation where an order was either not placed correctly or not completed correctly, you need the rep on the line to correct the issue. If the issue is small, it may be resolved during the installation and paperwork can be sent in after the fact to tidy up the accounting. If there is a large problem, your provisioner may have to take the issue to his or her manager to clear it in a timely manner. If your carrier rep isn’t on the line during the installation, he or she should at least be available by phone during that time.

• Another hardware vendor: If your hardware vendor is technically incapable of performing the tests and setting confirmations that are required during the installation, you should consider replacing the vendor before the process even begins. If the installation is going south, a backup technician may be very useful.

• Building management: If the installation has problems, your hardware vendor may need to gain access to the main phone room for the building. This room is generally locked and on the first floor of the building, or possibly even in the basement. If you’re activating a circuit after normal business hours, you should arrange for access to this room if necessary.

Banning participants: You definitely don’t want to see these faces

Here’s a list of people you definitely don’t want to come to your installation party. If these people are there, they can hinder productivity, cause confusion, and make things go very, very badly. Send the following people out for a Starbucks run:

• Your sales agent: The main function of a salesperson is to sell, not to troubleshoot issues. Sales staff may have a general idea of how telecom works, but technical details are frequently not their strong suit. Having a salesperson on the line during a circuit installation generally causes everything to take longer and runs the process off on tangents. You should greatly discourage the person who sold you the service from being on the call for the installation. Your sales rep has better things to do, and everything will move much smoother without his or her presence.

• Any nontechnical people with strong opinions: This category of people includes managers, directors, vice-presidents, and CEOs of your company. The installation of a circuit is an event that requires a great deal of diplomacy on all sides. If someone on the call begins attacking one of the technicians on the line because of a problem, the technician may quickly (and conveniently) prove the issue is not within the carrier’s network and cease to troubleshoot the problem at that time. Only technical people with a calm demeanor should be allowed on an activation conference call. The emotional and uninformed will make the process take twice as long and not engender any good will with your carrier. And we can all use more good will.

 Tip  There are issues that occur, not because of a hardware fault at either end of the circuit, but actually as a result of the interaction between your carrier’s hardware and your phone system. These handshaking issues can generally be resolved by validating all the line coding, framing, and configuration information seen by both your carrier and your hardware vendor. If that information checks out, the issue could be of a more granular nature that needs more troubleshooting.

It is at this time of mounting frustration that you must be your most diplomatic. The hardware at your carrier’s end may pass self-diagnostic tests with flying colors. In fact, your phone system may also pass self-diagnostic tests, giving both your vendor and your carrier validation for feeling like it’s the other guy’s fault if the system fails. Technicians for both pieces of hardware can claim that whatever is causing the problem is not their issue. At this point, only their respect for you, your skills as a diplomat, and their commitment to the job (in that order) will allow you to push through to resolution.

If you are in the middle of an installation that begins to degenerate, you may have to separate your hardware vendor from the installation technician at your carrier. This may be the best way to get everyone to do what they need to do without anyone feeling threatened. Until you have been there, you won’t believe how easily things can move to problem solving to a systematic game of trying to prove the issue is someone else’s fault. Meanwhile, of course, the technicians ignore you, your phone system, the configuration process, and so on. On your dime.

If you are 99 percent sure you know where the problem is, there is a way to get Sam the tech to do additional testing, even if Sam’s irritated and emotional because he has been attacked for the past three hours. The technique begins when you calm down and call him up, without anyone else on the line. In your most under-standing voice, say, “I know the problem is not on your end, but my hardware vendor is flipping out and I just want to shut him up. Can you do this one test, just to prove, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that it is not in your network? Then I can make the vendor fix his end of this.” The technician will run the test, or even replace the faulty hardware. If the problem resolves itself, then you know he found the issue and fixed it. If the problem persists, at least you have one part of the troubleshooting done. Now it’s time to call the technician on the other side of the circuit.