Response Point FAQ
Why Buy Response Point?
Whether you're looking for your first business phone system or want something easier to use and more powerful than your current system, Response Point SP2 has the features and benefits you need. Here are the Top Ten Reasons to Buy the Microsoft Response Point SP2 phone system:
- Save up to 51%* on phone bills by switching to VoIP
- Pay as little as $12/month with Microsoft Financing**
- Remote workers can use Response Point phones just like they’re in the office
- Route calls automatically using the Automated Receptionist with easy after-hours configuration
- Easy-to-use features with state-of-the-art speech recognition technology
- Quick setup—fully functional in minutes out of the box
- Choose from multiple hardware systems and a growing collection of peripherals-including T1 gateways.
- Integrate and get even more power out of Microsoft Office, Small Business Server, and more.
- Intercom and paging functionality makes it easier to talk to your colleagues
- Check voice mail, forward to email, make calls and more using your PC —with customization options for IT specialists
What is Response Point?
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Easy to use and manage, Microsoft Response Point is innovative new phone system software that can help small businesses reduce communication costs and increase communication effectiveness with a radically simplified phone experience. You can access the phone and its features using just your voice. The intuitive Response Point Administrator software allows you to complete phone moves, additions, or changes with a few mouse clicks. And there is no special phone training or telephony networking expertise required. For a small business owner, Response Point offers a complete phone system—at an affordable price—that grows with your business.
What makes Response Point different from PBX systems?
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Response Point is an advanced phone system that radically streamlines the total phone configuration process for an enhanced user experience for small businesses. Response Point supports both cost-effective Voice-over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and traditional analog telephone lines, comes with built-in voicemail, and includes a breakthrough voice-activated user interface designed to give small businesses all the phone capabilities they need—in a single, easy-to-install box. Response Point easy to manage phone system enables a small business to make routine staffing-related moves, additions, or changes quickly and easily.
How can Response Point save my small business time and money?
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Response Point can save small businesses time and money in three ways:
- It reduces phone system management costs by empowering average PC users to complete moves, additions, and changes reducing expensive onsite support.
- It lets small businesses slash their phone bills by using VoIP to cut long-distance bills and eliminate unnecessary local lines without forcing them to abandon their traditional phone service.
- It eliminates many expensive phone system extras—expansion packs, hours of employee training, etc.—that typically add thousands of dollars to the cost of a small business phone system.
What size of small business benefits most from Response Point?
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Response Point can benefit small businesses with as few as one employee and can grow with your business up to as many as 50 employees... Response Point is optimized for small businesses and organizations that need powerful telephony features, but aren’t large enough to justify a dedicated IT staff. Businesses with more than 50 employees and a full-time IT staff are likely to consider additional features.
What features does Response Point offer that go beyond a standard phone system?
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Response Point transforms phone system management and user experience from end to end.
- Response Point brings high-quality speech recognition to the phone experience, allowing users to embrace phone features that were previously cumbersome or complicated to use. Just say, “Transfer my call to Joe,” instead of memorizing the right call-transfer keystrokes and Joe’s extension number. Call anyone in the company, or any of your Microsoft Office Outlook contacts, just by saying a name.
- Response Point offers a helpful, automated receptionist that is fully customizable (you can record your own voice and company message), and includes the ability to add FAQs about your business (e.g., your hours, location, etc.). Callers need only speak their desired party’s name and they will be transferred to that extension.
- Administrators can easily complete moves, additions, and changes with a few simple mouse clicks. The whole system can be managed by an average PC user, rather than a phone networking specialist.
Is the speech recognition feature truly reliable? Is there a workaround in case I don’t want to use voice?
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Response Point’s high-quality speech-recognition capability is the result of long-term investment by Microsoft in speech-recognition research and development. Microsoft is deeply committed to its vision of delivering a rich voice communication experience. Response Point represents the best small business phone system Microsoft has produced yet. There are traditional keystroke sequences for Response Point features as well, so customers who prefer not to use voice commands can still take advantage of the product’s other benefits.
How does Response Point benefit mobile information workers?
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Response Point benefits mobile workers in several ways. First, it allows users to easily forward their office extensions to external lines, so callers get the same professional, seamless service from mobile workers in and out of the office. Second, Response Point lets users retrieve and archive voicemail messages in e-mail. Windows Mobile users have found this particularly useful, since they can get instant notification of new voicemails and easily retrieve any message—new or archived—from nearly any location. Third, Response Point gives users access to all their Office Outlook contacts from almost any phone, via voice commands. And these calls can be connected over a VoIP line. To enable VoIP service, customers should obtain an integrated access device from their internet service provider (ITSP), plug it into the Response Point base unit, then configure the service through the Administrator program in the Add Voice Service Wizard*.
*While customers can use most VoIP service providers, we recommend choosing services from Response Point Preferred ITSP, listed in this wizard for optimal configuration information download rather than manually obtaining and entering configuration information into the “What information did your service provider give you?” page.
How much will Response Point systems cost?
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Customers can purchase a starter pack, featuring one base unit, a four-port ATA, and four to five phones for between $2,500 and $2,999. Additional phones will cost $149–$159 each. A typical, complete 20-phone system will cost less than $5,500 at manufacturer’s suggested retail price.
Technical and Troubleshooting Questions
What is the maximum number of incoming lines Response Point will handle?
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We recommend Microsoft Response Point for small businesses with up to 50 employees and external phone lines in increments of 4 or 8. For additional cost savings, we recommend switching to VoIP.
How do you manage the system?
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The Response Point Administrator is the central administration and monitoring program to configure and maintain the system. The intuitive user-interface lets you add or change a phone, monitor and back up the base unit, alter call handling, and perform many other functions. You can install it on any computer without any special technical expertise or training. There is no restriction on the number of people who can run the Administrator software, but access to the program is password protected. One console includes the Administrator program, which has three tabbed pages: the Phone System page, the Base Unit page, and the Call Routing page.
What about patching and backup?
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Within the Administrator, backups are initiated manually with two-clicks, when and where you want it. Back-ups include all data from the base unit, for seamless recovery, all data is saved quickly using little storage space. Updates are managed by the firmware deployment wizard, which distributes patches to all of the phones and analog gateway devices on the network to save administrative time and increase network efficiency.
You have said that Response Point is easy enough for a "tech savvy" PC user to deploy... Why would a small business need to pay a separate IT specialist to do this?
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Some small businesses may prefer to work with an outside IT specialist to install and deploy Response Point, as well as for regular maintenance. For others who are do-it-yourselfers, Response Point has easy-to-follow configuration instructions that technically experienced PC users can follow; within a few clicks, for easy to complete system changes (adds, moves, and changes) and other basic management tasks.
As a user of the Response Point system, how do I customize the settings for my calls and phone?
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Everyone with a Response Point phone should install the Response Point Assistant software, a simple interface that runs on your desktop computer. This lets each user customize his/her user experience. Install the Response Point Assistant software for as many users as you need at no additional cost.
The Assistant lets you specify:
- How you receive voicemail messages—by phone, as e-mail attachments, or both
- Call forwarding
- Whether you want to be listed in the company directory
- On-computer screen caller notifications
- 1,100 personal contacts you can access for voice-dialing
- Bypass Receptionist for select callers
If you forward your calls to a mobile phone, does it pass through the caller's phone number, or just show your corporate phone number?
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The incoming call will show your corporate number.
Is Response Point a IP-PBX (or VoIP-based) phone system?
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Response Point is a SIP-based small business phone system that supports traditional analog, VoIP, and digital voice service. While old analog phones can be configured to the Response Point product with a loss to the voice command functionality and a decreased user-experience, we recommend Response Point supported hardware for optimal quality and usability.
Does Response Point require that a company use Microsoft Office, Office Outlook, Microsoft Exchange Server, Microsoft Office Communicator, Microsoft Office Communications Server, Microsoft Office Live Communications Server, etc.?
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No. Response Point is a fully functional standalone phone system that requires only a wired LAN and one Microsoft Windows-based PC for administering the system and managing changes. It has several integration features that allow Office Outlook and Exchange Server users to do more with Response Point, but does not require that customers use Microsoft Office products.
What other Microsoft products and applications integrate with Response Point?
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Response Point also integrates with Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. You can import all of your Office Outlook contacts into the Response Point system and access them by pressing the Response Point button and speaking a name to initiate a call—both in the office and access them by speaking a name to initiate a call. You could configure this feature with any e-mail server, including Exchange—as attachments.
Which VoIP carriers does Response Point support?
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We do not restrict customers’ choice of service providers. While customers can use most VoIP service providers, for quality and performance, we recommend choosing services from Response Point Preferred ITSP, found in the Administrator program’s “Add Voice Service Wizard” for optimal configuration information download rather than manually obtaining and entering configuration information.
When will Response Point support direct T1 trunking?
(+)How does Response Point handle unusual names or names that aren’t common in English? If a name is spelled vastly different than it sounds, how will Response Point deal with that?
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Response Point has a large built-in database of pronunciations of common names, understands how spelling works, and figures out the various ways an unfamiliar name might be pronounced as well as handling common mispronunciations.
Does RP have the ability to create/use three-way calling?
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Yes, Response Point handsets support three-way calling.
Can Response Point’s U.S. speech recognizer work with Spanish?
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No, the U.S. version of Response Point supports a variety of English dialects, but does not currently work in other languages. The core speech engine is built on the same technology currently shipping in multiple languages for Exchange Server 2007, Windows Vista and other speech-recognition-enabled Microsoft products, so we expect to offer this for Response Point in the future as well.
How many minutes of voicemail does Response Point hold?
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In the default configuration, Response Point can hold approximately over 16 hours (1,000 minutes) of voicemail. Ask your phone provider for details since capacity may increase depending on your hardware manufacturer.
What happens when Response Point storage is full?
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Voicemail is automatically deleted when it’s 30 days old. To create more space on the base unit, forward your voicemail to e-mail and archive it. You can also use the backup option within the Administrator to back up all your data to a file.
What happens if I lose the Administrator password?
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Response Point comes with a set of utilities for resetting the unit to the default settings without losing data. Refer to the Installation CD for additional details.