Hemsley Fraser

Hemsley Fraser is a leading global company which helps organisations and individuals to succeed and improve through the provision of innovative learning solutions. They have a strong UK, European and North American presence and a global network of over 400 training professionals. In an increasingly competitive environment where the quality of each staff member’s skill and training is often the key differentiator, Hemsley Fraser help their clients to become higher-performing organisations. This includes working with companies such as Airbus, Norwich Union Life, MBDA, Royal Bank of Scotland Group and West Bromwich Building Society.

As a people-focused business, it is vital that Hemsley Fraser enable their staff to communicate efficiently internally and externally, to ensure the highest level of customer service at all times. With their two main UK offices in London and Saltash, Cornwall, plus a further main office in Boston, Massachusetts this was proving to be a challenge, not only in terms of efficiency but also in terms of cost. Matthew Walker, the company’s Head of IT, explains further, “The UK offices alone support more than 200 people, plus the staff in the US on top of that. We needed to replace our old BT Meridian system with a converged communications solution which would enable us to make free calls between all three sites, but which would also operate as one single system. We wanted a range of functions, like the ability to make calls between sites just using an internal extension, or to see when someone else is on the phone, even if they are on the other side of the Atlantic.”

Matt started to look around for a sophisticated Voice over IP solution, considering Avaya and Mitel along the way. However after meeting with Commsplus, who pro-actively approached him at just the right time, he saw the Samsung OfficeServ in action and ultimately selected this solution as his preferred choice.

Before anything could be installed Commsplus carried out a full VoIP audit for Hemsley Fraser to determine whether their network would support this technology without causing any problems with the current network, or having any affect on the voice quality. Happily everything checked out fine and the three Samsung OfficeServs could be installed, with the first system being implemented in Cornwall alongside the existing switch to ensure minimal disruption during the changeover. With this system in Saltash successfully in place, Commsplus engineers then installed the next OfficeServ in London and liaised with Samsung engineers in the US, who were installing the system there, to connect all three sites together. The whole process was successfully project managed by Commsplus.

Through Samsung IP technology, supplied by Commsplus, Hemsley Fraser have also been able to install IP phones for home workers and satellite offices throughout the world. This gives each remote staff member full access to the functionality of the system, without the need for anything more costly than an ADSL connection. As all handsets are fully IP enabled, staff that visit other sites can simply log on to a handset using their own personal details and then make or receive calls using their office DDI. As a result all have full access to their individual settings, preferences and address books, as if they were sitting at their normal desk.