Moving from T1 to PRI

[shep]

We recently put in a system with a channelized T1. The customer is getting a PRI and is having all the numbers on the T1 ported to the PRI and then converting the old T1 to PRI.
I have not done a PRI and I am a network tech not a phone guy.
Anything that I should be aware of?
PRI Protocol should this be network or user.
How many digits should I have the tel-co send me.
I don't know anything about DNIS mapping or DID ranges.
Is DNIS required for every number or only the ones that need to direct dial.
Do I need more than one trunk group to route calls to different extensions or can I use DNIS take care of this?

Thanks
Brad

[Forum]

Wow. I would not take on this move without assistance. I've done this several times, and should take a qualified person about 20 min's to complete (depending on how quickly telco ports). But not having any idea makes it a little bit harder.

there is actually alot that goes into it. Changing the types on the T1 switch itself (Ni2, 5ess, B8zs, etc). Creating trunk groups, and all associated features (DID, DNIS, etc), and dialing plan. You also should disable the old trunk group from Class-of-service, and enable the new one for the user group that has access to it.

You need to work with the carrier on the switch configuration. I usually end up with NI2 (or national), B8ZS, ESF, line, Slave.

DID can be either 4(as long as there is no overlap) or 7 digit

DNIS is different than DID. You will probably only use DID

You only need one trunk group.

[cburgy]

We configure all of our trunk groups for 10 digits.... Ran into a scenario a couple times where the carrier was sending the full 10 digits and we needed to match... It is NOT an easy process to reconfigure a trunk group for a different set of digits... especially if you have 400 DIDs assigned. SIGH.

[Jason Learmouth]

Chris, we had a similar issue in Australia where the carrier sends 10, but we couldn't work around it because ShoreTel won't accept more than 9 digits for an Australian site. Since then ShoreTel has corrected this and the system now works if it receives more digits than it is expecting - in Australia anyway

[cburgy]

Chris, we had a similar issue in Australia where the carrier sends 10, but we couldn't work around it because ShoreTel won't accept more than 9 digits for an Australian site. Since then ShoreTel has corrected this and the system now works if it receives more digits than it is expecting - in Australia anyway

Argh! You also can get into freaky problems with proceeding zeros... We've seen this too (not a problem with 10 digit). You could have 4 digits setup and it might be 0100-0200... Well telco equipment sees 0 as a null value and ignores it. Brilliant.

[shep]

I should have said earlier that we are adding a T1 switch for the new PRI. I have the configuration from the telco except the protocol. I am assuming it will be ISDN user. My goal is to have the switch and trunk group configured prior to making the switch. The DID and DNIS is what I do not have any idea about how or what to set up.
It looks like having the telco send 10 digits is the safest
This site has a few lines that are analog going to a fax server those are currently the only extensions that can be dialed directly, these extensions will need to stay that way. I need to not allow anything except the fax access to these trunks. Do I still only want 1 trunk group. For the incoming calls I assumed I would use DNIS and map the number to the extension. To get the fax server to work currently each fax line has is its own trunk group.

Thanks
Brad

[gberkemeyer]

This site has a few lines that are analog going to a fax server those are currently the only extensions that can be dialed directly, these extensions will need to stay that way. I need to not allow anything except the fax access to these trunks. Do I still only want 1 trunk group. For the incoming calls I assumed I would use DNIS and map the number to the extension. To get the fax server to work currently each fax line has is its own trunk group.

Thanks
Brad

Brad,

If I were you, I would port the fax server line(s) to the PRI also. I'm assuming that you currently have x number of POTS lines for the fax server with the first one being the main fax number and the others setup as hunt lines by the CO. This would save money on POTS lines and also free up analog ports on a Shoregear switch. You would just port all published fax numbers to the PRI and point those numbers to your Fax server's first line(extension) using DID and/or DNIS. Then configure your fax server extensions to forward/busy from one to the next in sequence, so the hunting that was being done by the CO is now done internally. For outbound calls, let the fax server use the PRI. Just be sure to set the CallerID on your fax server extensions to whatever your published fax number is. (That's one nice feature of PRI trunks is that you can control the outbound CallerID on a per extension basis)

Just a thought. That's the way we do ours.

Gary

[eazeaz]

First Time

With a change that big, and since it is your first time doing one of these, I think I would contract with someone here on the board to atleast provide some sort of remote support/plan.

If anything is done out of sequence on a change like this, the customer could be down for the good chunk of a day. I am sure that one of the guys here that have done this would be happy to look over what you have, what you are going to, your plan to do so, etc. I can't imagine you would be sinking more than 6 hours of discovery time into a plan.

I think a little short term love may pay off huge for you in the end.

Usually when I do changes that big, I find that I have outgrown our DID space, or am getting close. It may be the time to get x number of new DID numbers and forward the old to the new and start over.

[shep]

My terminology is not quite correct. I said analog lines I should have said extensions. All the incoming numbers are in a channelized T1. The fax numbers roll at the CO. They are on channels 18-24. When a call rings channel 18 it goes to a trunk group who's destination is the first fax server extension. Channel 19 rings the next fax extension so on and so forth.

[jasonepowell]

OH! Ok, thanks!

Is that also true for the IP8000 conference room phone, btw?

[gberkemeyer]

My terminology is not quite correct. I said analog lines I should have said extensions. All the incoming numbers are in a channelized T1. The fax numbers roll at the CO. They are on channels 18-24. When a call rings channel 18 it goes to a trunk group who's destination is the first fax server extension. Channel 19 rings the next fax extension so on and so forth.

Ok, well just so you know with a PRI, you don't have to isolate channels for the fax server unless perhaps you're concerned that all of your other channels may be in use and you want to make sure that you always have 7 channels available for faxing. We have over 200 fax DID's (actually they are DNIS entries) that come into a 23 channel PRI for our fax server. Those fax calls can come in on any channel and share those channels with voice calls.

Gary

[shep]

I think I have it figured out. Basically I make DNIS entries for the fax extensions and any other numbers that do not go to the main hunt group? DID is completely separate.
Is this correct?

[gberkemeyer]

I think I have it figured out. Basically I make DNIS entries for the fax extensions and any other numbers that do not go to the main hunt group? DID is completely separate.
Is this correct?

Yes, that is basically correct. If there is no DID or DNIS configured for an inbound call, it will go to the Default Inbound destination configured on the trunk group with one exception. The one exception is that if you have the CO sending in 4-digits (this is the ANI), and your ShoreTel system has a 4-digit extension that matches the ANI sent in, the call will route to that extension even if there is no DNIS or DID configured.

My rule of thumb is to use DID first because it can be configured at the user config, it makes their DID number display on their phone, and by default, this DID becomes their outbound callerID (which you can override by specifying another callerID value). Use DNIS if you need to route multiple calls to the same extension, workgroup, route point, or whatever. We also usually use DNIS for toll-free numbers because you can specify the "Dialed Number" on the DNIS entry and this displays for the ShoreTel user when the call comes in. You can enter any number or text that you want to at the Dialed Number.

Gary