This article originally appeared in the March 2013 issue of INTERNET TELEPHONY.

We are all reminded of the need for contingency planning for our data as well as voice communications when a natural disaster strikes. However, interrupted service can also be caused by unexpected call spikes, power outages, PBX (News - Alert) failures, loss of connectivity, as well as a natural disaster. 

When evaluating what procedures to implement in a failover/recovery plan for your business, keep in mind that the number of options is as varied. The technical sophistication of failover options is likely to correlate with the expertise of the service provider.

Typically, failover options from most Internet telephony service providers are either call forwarding or IP address forwarding.

Call Forwarding

This is the most popular choice for small to medium-sized businesses, as it does not require a backup PBX in a different physical location.

When phone service at your business location goes down for any reason — such as a power outage, PBX failure, broadband connectivity loss, or natural disaster — your SIP trunking provider can automatically redirect your calls to any telephone number, including a VoIP, PSTN, mobile, or international number.

You can choose to have all calls to any direct inward dial phone number on the trunk redirect to a prioritized list of numbers, or you can create a specific list for each DID.  

There are two types of call forwarding solutions – trunk-based and DID-based.

IP Address Forwarding

This solution generally appeals to larger companies with disaster recovery plans who choose to implement services from more than one carrier, or who have multiple locations.

There are two types of IP address forwarding solutions – single trunk failover and multiple trunk failover.

In addition to these failover/recovery options, SIP trunking provides the VoIP connection, the money savings, and the advanced business continuity features traditional phone systems cannot provide.

Mike Gruszka is director of product management at Broadvox (News - Alert) (www.broadvox.com).