Many years ago AT&T contracted with Alston to build a telephone answering system they could install in their central offices. Tascom built that system. However, the business portion of the deal fell through, so Alston had a system with no customers. They then decided to sell the Tascom system directly to end users. The first Tascom system was installed in 1980.
It was a thirty-two-seat Tascom redundant system, and for many years Tascom dominated the large system market. Tascom was the system most everyone wanted—it was considered the Cadillac of the industry. Today, Tascom’s largest system is over one hundred seats, far larger than the thirty-two seats in the early days. Call center systems are at the heart of the information age and will remain an intricate part of information distribution for small businesses for many years to come.
Tascom technology goes beyond the systems that helped start the information age. All Tascom systems are a seamless design of Microsoft™ SQL database and Asterisk softswitch and have the following feature tools in common: http and native SIP connections for all system communication (trunk, operator, and internal), HIPAA compliance, monitoring of operators to train and improve callers’ experience, and client web to enable customers to manage their own accounts to the degree allowed, such as handling their own on-call schedule.
Tascom ADAM (Alston Developed Asterisk Machine) is their full-featured large premise-based system. One of the special things about ADAM is that the communication is accomplished through http, which makes configuration easy because the stations communicate to a web server. Their wallboard apps are web accessible, making it easy to see what ADAM is doing.
ADAM in its purest software configuration has only a LAN connection. Virtually everything is possible because it is all programmable.
Tascom-Express, also a premise-based system, is for answering services with a smaller client base that still want to provide top-tier service at prices affordable for small businesses. Tascom-Express has virtually everything the large ADAM system incorporates, with some space and size limitations (up to eight seats).
Tascom’s hosted system installed its first two clients in 2006 and continues to service numerous businesses in multiple states on their multi-tenant hosted platform. The hosted system is like a large office building that leases office space to businesses. In this case, the flexible Tascom hosted platform leases system space to call centers and tele-messaging businesses. The space is measured by the number of operator seats or workstations wanted.
The hosted system has all the essential features as their premises ADAM or Tascom-Express system, with a few restrictions that Tascom personnel perform for their clients due to access security. They have a true multi-tenant hosted platform; customers do not buy a system.
Tascom follows the same model as most other hosting industries, whereby the cost of the system is far less than a system purchase. They add their customer’s business to their robust hosted system and spread the cost of software, software licenses, hardware, secure datacenter, SIP ports (talk path or voice trunks), and technical expertise to all users so that the individual site cost is reduced.
Tascom’s cloud system is a single-tenant hosted system located in their secure datacenter and designed for larger businesses or clients that want to offer a wider array of services. Clients on the cloud have decided that they are much better at managing their business than managing a system, so more of their resources can be dedicated to their business.
In their cloud solution, each business has its own complete system. This is a proprietary system exclusively for Alston Tascom’s customers with special needs. Although users share the facility and their technical expertise, they do not share software, hardware, or SIP ports. Businesses on Tascom’s cloud system tend to be larger corporations that require greater access or special requirements that are not available on the hosted system.
When looking for a call management system, consider Tascom. Contact them at www.alstontascom.com, info@alstontascom.com, or 866-282-7266.