[Asterisk-Users] OT: PRI costs in US

[tmassey at obscorp.com]

Hello!

Several of my customers would like to add a backup to their Internet 
connection.  ISDN is a good solution:  decently fast for a dial-up-type 
connection, yet still faily affordable.  While I was at it, I decided to 
look at a couple of more creative telephone service options to possibly 
improve their service or lower costs at the same time.  These customers 
range from having just a couple of POTS lines without a key system up to 
as many as 18 POTS lines into systems such as AT&T Merlin or Nortel 
Norstar systems.

My first thought on the higher end was a PRI line.  However, the cost 
seems *very* prohibitive.  The average cost for a PRI line was $550/month, 
just for "dial tone"!  I've heard others say that PRI becomes cost 
effective in the 8 line range, but the cost for the office with 14 lines 
($25/line * 14 lines) is only $350.  It would take 22 lines before the PRI 
would equal the cost of individual POTS lines!

As an aside, I did a survey of several of my customers with 10-30 
employees.  Most of them have POTS lines only (from between 4 and 10) fed 
into some sort of PBX.  Only one of them has a PRI line, and they wish 
they hadn't gone that way:  they thought they would need more lines than 
they do, and now they feel that they're way over-buying.

Am I missing something?  When is a PRI competitive with POTS?  And if I'm 
not missing something, is there an alternative between POTS and a PRI, 
particularly for 5-15 lines?  None of the telephone companies I called 
offered channelized T1 options for local service (let alone frac-T1), only 
PRI.  Are there other options?

Finally, any alternatives for smaller companies?  I tried to get a simple 
BRI ISDN line for Internet backup for the company with 18 POTS lines. 
#$@%@ Ameritech (excuse me, SBC) charges $10/month more if you don't sign 
a 36-month contract and wouldn't give it to them without a credit check, 
several pieces of company information, the names and telephone numbers of 
at least two officers of the company and a personal guarantee from an 
officer!  This for a customer who has had 18 POTS lines for *15* YEARS!

I hate SBC...

Thank you for reading my rant.  I would greatly appreciate any information 
or suggestions you might be able to give me.

Tim Massey