What is unified communications as a service?
Unified communications as a service (UCaaS) brings an organisation’s everyday communication tools together in a single cloud platform. Instead of a separate desk phone system, video conferencing tool and messaging app, staff get one service that covers them all, usually available on a computer, a mobile app and a desk phone if wanted.
“Unified communications” describes the idea of joining these channels up so people can move easily between them, for example turning a chat into a video call, or seeing whether a colleague is available before transferring a call. “As a service” means it’s delivered from the cloud on subscription, built on Voice over IP (VoIP), rather than run on equipment in the office.
What UCaaS typically includes
- Business phone system. Extensions, direct dial-in (DDI) numbers, call forwarding, voicemail and hunt groups, replacing a traditional on-premise PBX.
- Video meetings. Scheduled and ad hoc meetings, screen sharing and recording.
- Team messaging. Chat channels, direct messages and file sharing.
- Presence. Showing who is available, busy, in a meeting or offline.
- Mobile apps. Using a work number from a personal mobile, so staff can work anywhere.
- Integrations. Links to calendars, email and business applications.
UCaaS versus CCaaS
UCaaS and contact centre as a service (CCaaS) are often mentioned together, but they solve different problems.
- UCaaS is for internal communication and person-to-person calls. It’s designed around employees talking to each other and to the contacts they deal with directly.
- CCaaS is for customer contact at scale. It’s designed around queues of customers waiting for the next available agent, with automatic call distribution, IVR, call recording, quality assurance, workforce management and detailed contact centre reporting.
Some vendors offer both on one platform, and many organisations connect the two. The key question is volume and structure: once customer calls need to be queued, measured against a service level and handled by a team of agents, a contact centre platform is the right tool.
Why UCaaS matters for customer service
Even though UCaaS isn’t a contact centre system, it affects customer experience. When a contact centre agent needs to involve a specialist, such as a billing expert, an engineer or a manager, that person is usually on the UCaaS system. If the two systems are well connected, the agent can check presence, make a warm transfer with context and avoid sending the customer into a dead end. If they’re not, transfers get dropped and customers end up repeating themselves.
Choosing and connecting the two
When evaluating UCaaS alongside a contact centre, check how calls transfer between the systems, whether context travels with the call, how numbers are managed across both, and whether reporting can follow a customer’s call from the contact centre to the wider business. Getting those handoffs right matters as much as the features of either platform.