October 06, 2006   Q: How/why are banks using VOIP and related
IP telephony solutions?  Jeff Van Houten, Parish National Bank:
Primarily, PNB has chosen VOIP as a cost-savings measure. As the
bank expanded, we recognized a need for a telephony technology
that would give us low up-front costs [and] low maintenance
costs, and allow us to spend our recurring telecom budget
productively. By using VOIP we gained efficiency in our WAN
lines, freeing up needed bandwidth for other technologies, such
as videoconferencing and remote security monitoring. If your
telecom budget is more or less fixed, you might as well
transport higher-value-added services over those lines, as
opposed to leaving large blocks of bandwidth strictly for voice
calls.  Martyn Roetter, Arthur D. Little: Savings from IP
telephony can include reductions in charges for circuits and
conference calls; lower expenditures on moves, adds and changes,
and on voice and data systems maintenance; plus improvements in
areas such as call center productivity