With copper phone lines sunsetting, it’s time to look at POTS replacement solutions. But what you choose matters. A POTS replacement solution is a router that routes analog signals over wireless or cellular networks. These solutions save money, offer redundancy, and meet life-safety requirements.
Reliability
The reliability of POTS lines has long been a primary concern for facility managers, especially regarding life safety systems like fire alarms or elevator emergency phones. These critical services are often used during emergencies when seconds count, and they must be able to operate without interruption to prevent unnecessary loss of life or property. A POTS replacement solution that converts copper signals to wireless or cellular networks offers a more reliable option than traditional phone lines, ensuring that these vital services continue to work as expected during an emergency. For organizations still relying on traditional POTS lines, switching to a more reliable solution is vital to reduce maintenance and operational costs and avoid costly outages or disruptions. Many POTS line replacement solutions come with 24/7/365 monitoring, and several options also include battery backup to ensure that life safety devices remain active during power outages. If you’re looking for a simple way to eliminate the headaches associated with POTS lines, consider choosing an all-in-one POTS replacement solution that includes hardware, data, and phone service for one low monthly rate. These turnkey solutions are designed with regulatory compliance in mind and can support a wide range of life safety and security devices, including fire alarms, intrusion, building entry, and more.
Scalability
In an era when big telecom providers are working hard to sunset copper POTS lines, it’s time for your organization to start considering alternative solutions. The problem is that many business devices like fax machines, fire alarms, and elevators rely on traditional phone lines for communication. Simply replacing them with a VoIP or cellular-based system won’t do the trick, as these solutions are not designed to support the unique requirements that many of these devices have.
What’s more, with a typical rip-and-replace approach, the devices are left to integrate with new systems, and this is a difficult task that often leads to incompatibilities and additional costs. The answer is a POTS replacement solution that can deliver genuine redundancy and backup, so you don’t have to worry about disrupting your mission-critical communication infrastructure.
Cost
Historically, POTS lines were the lifeline for critical business applications, such as fire alarms, blue light phones, and security gates. However, copper wires are expensive to maintain and prone to damage from the elements, animals, and human contact. They also lack a robust network infrastructure and are susceptible to outages due to power outages or aging infrastructure. Many businesses seek alternatives to traditional landlines, including cellular-based solutions. As telecommunication carriers are no longer legally required to service POTS lines, prices are skyrocketing, and support is declining. This has made replacing old POTS lines with a reliable, code-compliant solution that can save organizations up to 50% on monthly phone costs for life safety and other mission-critical systems even more critical. While desktop telephony can easily migrate to VoIP, this rip-and-replace approach is only sometimes practical or feasible for mission-critical communications. A better alternative is to leverage a cellular-based solution that can run parallel to legacy systems, providing a low-risk and cost-effective solution for migrating from TDM to IP for all mission-critical connections.
Flexibility
The major telecom providers have no obligation to service copper landlines and are actively working to decommission them. With this in mind, a POTS replacement solution must be designed to be flexible enough to accommodate the many legacy devices requiring these lines, including fire alarms, burglar alarms, fax machines, elevators, and point-of-sale systems. Choosing the right solution compatible with existing hardware can save time and money. A system that can provide redundancy, active monitoring, and backhaul connectivity to the internet is essential. For example, if an elevator call box goes down, and you don’t have an alternative way to communicate with the building’s safety services department, that could lead to severe injuries and even lawsuits. This is why it’s critical to choose a POTS replacement solution that provides a true dial tone and can be integrated with various existing security and life safety devices so they can continue to function when the primary lines go down. A managed service provider (MSP) or systems integrator can help you assess how many copper lines you have and offer insight into solutions that will be compatible with your legacy hardware. Sometimes, it may be appropriate to rip and replace your existing equipment and migrate everything to a modern cloud-based communication solution. In other cases, keeping the current setup in place might make more sense, integrating a new router into your legacy device and backhauling data to a cloud management portal. Investing in the right POTS replacement solution can save businesses thousands of dollars each month and reduce the risk of costly downtime and future-proof technology.
Regulatory Compliance
While it is possible to migrate from traditional telephone service to VoIP for desktop telephony, more is needed for mission-critical communication devices that rely on analog POTS lines. Fortunately, a few options allow you to repurpose your existing equipment with a low-cost POTS replacement solution. These solutions are designed to reroute your dial tone to wireless and cellular networks, eliminating the need for traditional copper POTS lines. The most common option is a router at the end of your copper POTS lines that sends information via wireless and cellular networks rather than hardwired over your traditional telephone service. This ensures your critical life safety devices will still have a dial tone in case of a cut or outage and meet ASME regulations for elevator cabs requiring a phone line verification mechanism to operate when the cab is open.
