Business Relocation of Telecom and Internet

For some reason business owners have come to believe that relocating their telephone lines and Internet service can be done quickly and easily. Some of this misunderstanding and failed expectation may come from the ease of moving a cell phone number from one carrier to another. This is not the case for land line phone numbers or Internet service.

Telephone Service

Let's start with the phone service since it is most likely to cause the most grief. Many businesses relocating to a new facility are doing so for a number of reasons: larger or smaller facility, better lease rates, closer to there market, etc. Regardless of the reason, allowing for 60 to 90 days from the time of submitting  your order to the time you move in will save you allot of grief.

In some cases it will not matter how close the original facility is to the new one. There may be boundaries that you are unaware of that hold your phone numbers captive. Never assume you can take your numbers with you until you have contacted your telecom provider, verified the move, and received confirmation. In addition, you may have decided that a different telecom carrier might provide more features at a lower cost, but the numbers could be stuck in a geographic area with your original provider. So what do you do?

Losing a business phone number is bad for business and so you need to consider opting to have the main number forwarded to a new set of numbers. This is not like having the numbers moved, you will have a new number or set of numbers which all of your outbound calls will use and display in caller ID. The original numbers will just allow anyone calling them to be forwarded to your new number. This way you don't loose out on the call from a potential client.  

Internet Service

Relocating Internet service can be a simpler process unless you have static public IP addresses, a special numbering scheme that may be assigned to your Internet equipment to identify your equipment on the Internet. If this is the case then you have a similar issue as with moving your telecom number. You may also find that the service you have in one location is not available from that same provider in another location. Most commonly the situation would be a case where you have broadband cable Internet service but the new facility may only have local data service from the major telecom provider and DSL may not be an option.

The good thing about IP addresses verses a phone number is that it is much easier to let the world know your address has changed. The most difficult aspect will be if you have a software application license that the vendor has tied to your Internet address. You will need to contact that software vendor and let them know of the change so they can update their records.

Other aspects of an Internet service change would be related to locally hosted services such as a web server or e-mail server. For these systems and services you will need to update your Domain Name provider with the correct IP address of these systems.

ISP and Telecom Vendors

Things have changed over the past several years that have allowed services to become available by many more providers. Just because you are relocating doesn't mean you need to stay with the current vendor. Take the time to review your options with other vendors. A telecom broker might be a good choice to have join your team of outside resources because they will know best which providers can serve your needs and help negotiate the best prices.

IT Support Person

Having an IT support person that understands all that is involved with the relocation of these services can be invaluable. Be sure to provide as much notice as possible so that the planning can begin immediately and that any orders for changes to service can begin. Again, allow 60 to 90 days minimum for the provisioning of any new service the new location, even though you have service already.

We hope that this information is helpful. Please let us know how this has helped you or if you have additional questions. As always Firestone Technical Resources, Inc. is here to help with your computer support issues - "Providing personal service for your impersonal technology."