Hosted PBX telephone systems have many advantages over purchasing a standard PBX or VOIP system for your office. The main advantages are listed below:

• Reduced Hardware Costs
• Reduced Upgrade Costs
• Always Having The Latest Features
• Cheaper Calls
• Easy System Management

Each of the above is covered in more depth in the following sections.

Reduced Telephone System Hardware Costs

With a hosted PBX phone system, instead of buying the hardware, you subscribe to a service proved by the hosting company, which is run on their hardware. Because of this there is no initial outlay on hardware for your offices, which for many small businesses is a significant capital expenditure. You will, of course, still have to purchase handsets that are compatible with the system provided by your PBX hosting company, however in comparison to the purchase cost of PBX system hardware and software this outlay is minimal.

Reduced System Upgrade Costs

As the system hardware and software is being provided by the hosting company, when they upgrade their systems you will automatically be upgraded. This means that your phone system will always have the latest software and you won't have the tiresome task of installing software, firmware and security updates to your system (or paying an outside contractor to do this).

Always Having The Latest Features

As your PBX hosting provider will be updating software and hardware on a regular basis, this will mean that you will always have the latest features and technology advances to use. This benefit is of exceptional value to small companies who even if they can afford their own PBX, won't be able to affod to upgrade more often than every 3-5 years.

Cheaper Calls

Having a PBX hosting provider will allow your calls to stay on the digital network longer and reduce the dependance on the analogue network, the provider will also have bulk traffic discounts and in most cases will be able to pass these on to you, thus reducing your call costs.

Easy System Management

This is an area that we always thought was the nightmare for most small business, managing your own PBX and working out all the functionality was a seriously non-trivial task. However the telecoms companies seem to have taken this on board and the PBX management software that is now available has made some tremendous steps forward (like noticing that web servers exist). Now the vast majority of hosted PBX providers will be able to offer a web management console, so that you can make changes to your system when ever you need to.

If you are seriously considering opting for a hosted PBX solution for your telephone system, we suggest that you read our Disadvantages of Hosted PBX page and look at our list of Hosted PBX Providers.