Alston Tascom News

Alston Tascom, Inc manufactures, sells, services and hosts the Evolution System, an end-to-end contact center and telephone answering service communications solutions.  The Evolution System is offered as a Premise-Based (purchased) system, and it is also available on a Hosted basis. Alston Tascom introduced the industry to such advances as TCP/IP protocol, Windows networking, Microsoft SQL Server database technology, drag and drop screen technology, and Visual Basic Scripting.

Contact Centers throughout the U.S. and Canada have relied on Alston Tascom since automated answering service systems were introduced in the early 1980's. They set the industry standard as the developer of one of the original paperless telephone answering systems in the late 1970s. In the 1980s, they continued adding performance features to the Tascom Legacy System.

Tascom is the chosen system among the leaders and widely respected bureau owners in the TAS industry. By combining its proven, long-standing reputation for quality, reliability, and customer service with leading-edge technology, Alston Tascom delivers the best of the past, present, and future.

For more information, contact Alston Tascom at 866-282-7266, 909-548-7300, or info@alstontascom.com.  Also, look at the Alston Tascom newsfeed for the latest updates and check out Alston Tascom podcasts.

Alston Tascom Announces New SoftSwitch (June 2012)

Alston Tascom announced their newest SoftSwitch, ADAM (Alston Developed Asterisk Machine). ADAM is the brainchild of the Alston Tascom open source team. ADAM will provide call centers with a SoftSwitch and office PBX, and it accommodates TDM, SIP, fax, remote office, remote agents, and any combination of tools for a call center and office. The redundant design of ADAM has the call center in mind, in order to keep all calls answered all the time.

Julio Roman Joins Alston Tascom (June 2012

Alston Tascom announced the newest member of their team, Julio Roman. He has joined the customer service department and is assigned to field installation of Alston Tascom’s Evolution system featuring ADAM.

“I am excited to welcome Julio to the Alston Tascom team,” said Wayne Scaggs, president of Alston Tascom, “and we look forward to the contributions he will make in serving our customers.” Julio is a Marine veteran who was stationed in Romania and is still in the Marine reserves. Julio comes to Alston Tascom with Marine discipline and a wealth of knowledge in networking. 

Alston Tascom's Universal Communicator FR-500 (May 2010)

Alston Tascom will unveil the Tascom FR-500 communicator system at the upcoming ATSI 2010 convention in May.  When triggered, the system will phone a call center's customer base to inform them of new features, a system upgrade, a progress report on system issues, a change in available services, or any other condition or relevant information.  Customers are notified in a timely, efficient, and cost-effective manner.  This autonomous service works on any call center platform or on stand-alone basis.

The service can also be sold to clients, such as political groups calling voters for a local election.  Another application is facilitating communication within small teams (such as first responders) or multiple teams.  The system uses multiple lines, and once the initial contact persons have been reached in each team, it moves on to call other teams until the response unit is completely manned.  The FR-500 communicates over SIP trunks, PRI, or analog lines; pricing is extremely affordable.

Alston Tascom Hosted Solution Shines in 2008 (April 2009)

Alston Tascom's Hosted Evolution System provided alternative business solutions for eleven additional telemessaging companies in 2008.  The new businesses range from two seats to ten seats, handling a few hundred calls a month to over 120,000 calls.  The businesses are all located in North America, ranging from California to Florida and from Toronto to Texas.

"When it seems like this economic environment is closing in on you, there is a way out," said Alston Tascom president Wayne Scaggs.  "Alston Tascom has a solution."

Alston Tascom Releases Two-Way SMS (Sep 08)

A new feature recently added to Alston Tascom's Evolution System is two-way SMS (Short Message Service) to facilitate more effective text communication with cell phones.  SMS allows short text messages, usually up to 160 characters, to be sent to cell phones and other devices.  This is ideal for a short message or an urgent communication.

SMS is a critical communication option because "cell phones can receive a digital signal when the phone cannot be used for voice," explained Wayne Scaggs, Alston Tascom's president.  "Hence, SMS communications can replace pagers in most cases."  An added benefit is that SMS for cell phones is a nationwide service that is included with most cell phone plans. 

However, a frequent concern in using SMS for critical communications is not knowing if the client received the transmission.  Alston Tascom has addressed this limitation with two-way SMS, which confirms the receipt of the message when the recipient replies.  Now call centers using SMS for client communications can be assured that their message was received by the client.

Alston Tascom and Homisco Join Forces (Mar 08)

Alston Tascom Inc. and Homisco Inc. have merged.  Homisco Inc. is a global provider of software solutions, system integration, and Software as a Service (SaaS) for markets that include education, financial, government, healthcare, hospitality, legal, retail, wireline, and wireless carriers.  Founded in 1981, Homisco, based in Melrose, MA, is an established telecommunications supplier of hardware and software solutions. 

In 2002 Homisco acquired Braxtel, a provider of comprehensive customer contact solutions that enable organizations to more easily, effectively, and economically manage their customer interactions across multiple channels, including phone, email, fax, and the Web.  Braxtel's flagship product, Fluency Communications Suite, is the core element for the Tascom Evolution Digital Switch.

Wayne Scaggs will remain president of Alston Tascom; he will retain a majority stake in Alston Tascom and own stock in Homisco Inc.  "We have been looking for the opportunity to join with a company that understood the power of the Evolution System," said Scaggs.  Ronald Contrado, president of Homisco Inc., concluded that this move is a natural fit for both companies.

Alston Tascom's Hosted System Continues to Make Advances (Jan 08)

Alston Tascom's hosted Evolution system is now processing over 65,000 calls a week.  Six different companies subscribe to their hosted system, two of which are inputting data.  Subscribers include sites without offices and a site with agents in different states.  Alston Tascom's hosted system allows teleservice companies to be the experts in their operation and leave the technology Alston Tascom. 

Additionally, during the month of December, Alston Tascom signed up the seventh company to enjoy the benefits of the hosted Evolution system.  "We are growing, and we've found a way for our customers to make more money with less headaches," said Alston Tascom's Wayne Scaggs.  "Another recent accomplishment has been to connect agents in the Philippines to the hosted system to provide overflow and backup agents for the companies using our hosted system.  The agents can fill in the gaps during the day or work the midnight shift.  The hosted Evolution system provides telemessaging services to anyone, anywhere, anytime with an adequate broadband connection."

Drug Free America Thanks Alston Tascom (Mar 06)

Drug Free America recently thanked Alston Tascom for its support of the play, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.  Ms. Lar'Juanette Williams, Director of Optasia Productions, said, "Your support and generosity not only assisted us in internal communications, but gave us a reason to present two additional public performances.  Without the support of Alston Tascom and others, Optasia Productions Children's Theater and Drug Free America, Inc. would not exist.  Also, your representative, Steve Mitchell, did a wonderful job playing Reverend Hopkins.  It is fantastic that your support included allowing Steve to participate." 

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever is a modified play promoting a drug and alcohol free lifestyle.  The play depicts the drug and alcohol problem in children and teens and the advantages of remaining drug free.

Drug Free America, Inc. stated that this was the best response they have had to any of their Knoxville, TN programs.  "Our message of a drug free America was presented in a fun and entertaining way to young people and their parents.  Alston Tascom was instrumental in making this happen."

Alston Tascom Releases Hosted Version of the Evolution System (Sep 05)

At the 2005 ATSI convention in June, Alston Tascom released a hosted version of their Evolution system, called Evolve.  Evolve provides a hosted telemessaging VoIP system for any number of workstations.  With Evolve, all a telemessaging call center needs is a PC and DSL connection for each workstation.

What is not needed is paying system equipment costs, monthly phone bills, system maintenance, service agreements, and buying spare parts or finding someone to install the parts and maintain the system.  This makes Evolve ideal for startups, an alternative to replacing an aging call processing system, providing an easily and quickly scalable platform, or implementing home based agents to replace a traditional centralized call center.  The host system is located and maintained at Evolution headquarters in Chino, CA.

Alston Tascom Unveils Emergency Notification Application (Jun 04)

Alston Tascom announced its Alert & Emergency Notification System (AENS), which can be hosted on Evolution systems or used as a stand-alone product.  This is a timely offering with the post 9-11 security alerts.  Every city has an emergency alert officer.  Fire and police departments require emergency notification.  Oil refinery spills, bomb threats, school closures, and floods all require community notification.

AENS is a crucial component to any facility's emergency and disaster plan.  It automates any manual notification process using various communications media including telephone, cell phones, text pagers, numeric/tone pagers, email, fax, and wireless personal digital assistants.  It can deliver incident-specific information, qualify an individual's availability, and accept recipient feedback.  Comprehensive reporting is included.

AENS provides facilities or organizations with a full featured notification system including standard notification, priority notification, and location based notification.  It also features security levels, stop notification with recall, user-defined number of retries, database encryption, system self test with notification, system self-monitoring with notification, and heartbeat with notification system.

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