Cloud Voice from Virgin Media O2 Business
Cloud Voice product is a hosted communications and collaboration service based on Cisco’s BroadSoft and Webex technology, removing the need for you to have an on-premise PBX and voice networking on each of your working sites. It allows you to address your voice telecommunications needs through your existing data access.
Features
- IVR
- Auto attendant
- Call analytics
- Call centre / contact centre
- Voice recording
- CRM Integration
- Webex (collaboration and video conferencing)
- Call directory
- Busy Lamp Field
- Administration Portal
Benefits
- Increased productivity through enabling collaboration anywhere
- Moves to the cloud - fully hosted
- Simple pricing model to suit your business (Opex or Capex)
- Easy portal administration
Pricing
£8 to £14.50 a licence a month
- Education pricing available
Service documents
Request an accessible format
Framework
G-Cloud 14
Service ID
3 8 5 4 1 4 6 3 3 1 0 9 5 7 4
Contact
Virgin Media Business
Diane Murray
Telephone: 07973 622296
Email: publicprocurement@virginmedia.co.uk
Service scope
- Software add-on or extension
- Yes, but can also be used as a standalone service
- What software services is the service an extension to
- Need internet access to use Cloud Voice.
- Cloud deployment model
- Private cloud
- Service constraints
-
CPE (Customer Premise Equipment) such as handsets have certain firewall configurations. In addition, there are minimum bandwidth requirements on the customer internet service; minimum of 10mbps download and upload.
The Cloud Voice solution periodically performs updates at no disruption to the end users. these are typically done during low periods and not during the working day. - System requirements
-
- Minimum bandwidth requirements as specified
- Internet access
User support
- Email or online ticketing support
- Email or online ticketing
- Support response times
- We have a 24 x 7 x 365 support model.
- User can manage status and priority of support tickets
- Yes
- Online ticketing support accessibility
- None or don’t know
- Phone support
- Yes
- Phone support availability
- 24 hours, 7 days a week
- Web chat support
- Web chat
- Web chat support availability
- 24 hours, 7 days a week
- Web chat support accessibility standard
- None or don’t know
- How the web chat support is accessible
- Accessible through a web browser to the Supplier's support page.
- Web chat accessibility testing
- Not applicable
- Onsite support
- Yes, at extra cost
- Support levels
-
Support level 1: Supplier website, where users can access chat functions, help guides and FAQs.
Support level 2: Dedicated Account Manager and 24 x 7 Cloud Voice Service Desk.
Support level 3: Professional services, subject to additional cost dependent upon requirements. For instance on site training, how-to guides, installation.
We will provide a Technical Account Manager and Client Relationship manager dependent on the spend of the business. - Support available to third parties
- Yes
Onboarding and offboarding
- Getting started
-
All administrators of the hosted telephony system will recieve a welcome email with login details and basic user information.
- Will also receive a demonstration on how to use it.
- End user will receive links to user guides and booklets on the system
- Onsite or virtual training is also available at a cost
- There is also dedicated cloud voice helpline available to help with any user issues
- Depending on the size of their solution, they may also have a dedicated client relationship manager - Service documentation
- Yes
- Documentation formats
-
- HTML
- End-of-contract data extraction
- Data such as numbers can be ported to another telecoms provider at the end of contract. User specific data can be requested by administrator.
- End-of-contract process
-
At the end of the contractual period, the service continues and goes into a monthly rolling contract. The price will continue at the same price as within contract.
At this point, you can request a contract renewal.
Using the service
- Web browser interface
- Yes
- Supported browsers
-
- Microsoft Edge
- Firefox
- Chrome
- Safari
- Application to install
- Yes
- Compatible operating systems
-
- Android
- IOS
- MacOS
- Windows
- Designed for use on mobile devices
- Yes
- Differences between the mobile and desktop service
- No significant differences.
- Service interface
- Yes
- User support accessibility
- None or don’t know
- Description of service interface
- Customers will access a business portal where they can manage users' setup hunt groups, and see the configuration of their telephony system.
- Accessibility standards
- None or don’t know
- Description of accessibility
-
You can manage and configure the non-chargeable features of your company, site and users.
There are three levels of access:
1) Company Administrator
2) Group Administrator
3) End User - Accessibility testing
- N/A
- API
- Yes
- What users can and can't do using the API
-
CRM INTEGRATOR
Enables users to integrate call control into several CRM systems, providing the following functionality:
Automatic screen popping of customer files when inbound calls are received
Call Control from Windows or MAC
Click-to-dial from CRM file
In addition, the application will allow:
Configuration/control of several features
Monitoring of a User’s presence status - API documentation
- Yes
- API documentation formats
- HTML
- API sandbox or test environment
- Yes
- Customisation available
- Yes
- Description of customisation
-
Users can mix and match licences according to business need.
Individual users can choose their own favourites.
Users can select which features they want or don't want for instance hold music, customised voicemail and selective call acceptance.
Scaling
- Independence of resources
-
We offer unbeatable reliability – Our key differentiator is resilience, providing every customer with
geographic resilience as standard, further enhanced by competitive and service credit backed fault fix times.
The service is hosted in the cloud and therefore only limitation would be the internet access of the end user.
Analytics
- Service usage metrics
- Yes
- Metrics types
-
- Call analytics; Enables businesses to use web portal to review all of their call statistics in near-time
from pre-defined dashboard and/or wallboards.
The dashboard provides visual call activity, updated every 15 minutes, which includes:
• Hourly/daily calldistribution
• Call activity by DDI/extension/user
• Missed call summary
• Unreturned missed calls by caller ID
The wallboard provides a number of pre-configured visual displays which include:
• DDI summary
• User summary
• Business summary
Each setup requires 1 mandatory supervisor admin login to be allocated.
- Number of calls made
- Wait times for calls
- Number of users - Reporting types
-
- Real-time dashboards
- Regular reports
- Reports on request
Resellers
- Supplier type
- Reseller providing extra support
- Organisation whose services are being resold
- BT Wholesale
Staff security
- Staff security clearance
- Other security clearance
- Government security clearance
- Up to Security Clearance (SC)
Asset protection
- Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
- Yes
- Data storage and processing locations
-
- United Kingdom
- European Economic Area (EEA)
- User control over data storage and processing locations
- No
- Datacentre security standards
- Complies with a recognised standard (for example CSA CCM version 3.0)
- Penetration testing frequency
- At least every 6 months
- Penetration testing approach
- ‘IT Health Check’ performed by a Tigerscheme qualified provider or a CREST-approved service provider
- Protecting data at rest
- Encryption of all physical media
- Data sanitisation process
- Yes
- Data sanitisation type
- Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
- Equipment disposal approach
- A third-party destruction service
Data importing and exporting
- Data export approach
- Main data is in the form of numbers .This can be ported to another provide who will contact us to gain the relevant information. User data such as call recording is stored on a 30 day, 180 day or 7 year period pre-defined by the user. This can be accessed by the user and exported to their own servers.
- Data export formats
- Other
- Other data export formats
-
- Audiofile
- Data import formats
- CSV
Data-in-transit protection
- Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
- Data protection within supplier network
-
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
- IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
Availability and resilience
- Guaranteed availability
-
The Supplier aims to have Services available to Buyers 24x7, and includes a SLA for system availability as well as call quality. SLAs are agreed on an individual basis and differ from organisation to organisation.
Cloud Voice is delivered Over the Top (OTT) meaning that it’s delivered like any other application over the Internet. Due to this, no Quality of Service (QoS) can be applied, and priority cannot be given to voice traffic. Contention on broadband connections can play a significant factor and, therefore, during peak usage times, you may experience further jitter and packet loss, impacting your voice conversation. QoS will be available only where IPVPN services are provided from the Supplier. - Approach to resilience
- Available on request.
- Outage reporting
- Email alerts, text message alerts and comms briefed out on our website.
Identity and authentication
- User authentication needed
- Yes
- User authentication
- Username or password
- Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
-
3 Levels of hierarchy with varying levels of autonomy and changeable features.
- Company level
- Site level
- User level - Access restriction testing frequency
- At least once a year
- Management access authentication
-
- Dedicated link (for example VPN)
- Username or password
Audit information for users
- Access to user activity audit information
- Users have access to real-time audit information
- How long user audit data is stored for
- Between 1 month and 6 months
- Access to supplier activity audit information
- No audit information available
- How long system logs are stored for
- At least 12 months
Standards and certifications
- ISO/IEC 27001 certification
- Yes
- Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001
- British Standards Institution
- ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date
- 23/01/2022
- What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover
- The ISO 27001 certificate covers the protection of Buyer and Supplier employee information that is managed within the Supplier's organisation.
- ISO 28000:2007 certification
- No
- CSA STAR certification
- No
- PCI certification
- No
- Cyber essentials
- Yes
- Cyber essentials plus
- Yes
- Other security certifications
- Yes
- Any other security certifications
-
- ISO 22301 Business Continuity Management
- ISO 20000 IT Service Management
Security governance
- Named board-level person responsible for service security
- Yes
- Security governance certified
- Yes
- Security governance standards
-
- ISO/IEC 27001
- Other
- Other security governance standards
- • Cyber Essentials Plus • ISO 20000 IT Service Management • ISO 22301 Business Continuity Management • ISO 9001 Quality Management System
- Information security policies and processes
- BT Wholesale has appropriate security policies and processes in place. We will ensure that the reporting structure is designed accordingly so that these processes are adhered to. Further information can be provided upon request.
Operational security
- Configuration and change management standard
- Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
- Configuration and change management approach
- We have a comprehensive configuration and change management processes that ensure we track changes to the service, through the lifetime of the contract. Prior to any change or configuration, potential security impacts are assessed and communicated.
- Vulnerability management type
- Supplier-defined controls
- Vulnerability management approach
-
Our partner BT Wholesale has appropriate processes in place to:
-Assess threats to the service
-Patch deployment
-Gain information on potential threats - Protective monitoring type
- Supplier-defined controls
- Protective monitoring approach
- Our partner BT Wholesale has a well developed protective monitoring processes to cover all of the above. Further details upon request.
- Incident management type
- Conforms to a recognised standard, for example, CSA CCM v3.0 or ISO/IEC 27035:2011 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
- Incident management approach
- We have a well established Incident Management process, managing any faults end to end. This will cover common events. End users can report incidents to the service desk via phone or account management.
Secure development
- Approach to secure software development best practice
- Supplier-defined process
Public sector networks
- Connection to public sector networks
- No
Social Value
- Social Value
-
Social Value
- Fighting climate change
- Covid-19 recovery
- Tackling economic inequality
- Equal opportunity
- Wellbeing
Fighting climate change
The Supplier’s approach to protecting the environment is detailed in our Environment Policy and guided by certification to internationally recognised standards and systems including ISO14001:2015. The Supplier has internal policies regulating water usage, waste disposal, minimising single-use plastics and carbon emission reduction.
In April 2023, we received validation from the Science Based Target initiative (SBTi) for the following carbon-reduction goals:
• Net zero by 2040 with a 90% reduction in value chain emissions (Scope 1, 2 and 3).
• Reducing operational emissions (scopes 1 and 2) by 90% and scope 3 emissions by 50% by the end of 2030.
• Reducing operational emissions (scopes 1 and 2) by 60% and scope 3 emissions by 25% by the end of 2025.
As of February 2024, the Supplier has reduced operational emissions by 45% (baseline FY2020). Here are some examples of the actions we’re implementing to achieve our goals:
• A stringent Code of Conduct requiring suppliers to have a board-approved carbon reduction plan with SBTi-aligned Net Zero goals and interim targets.
• Continuing to source 100% renewable electricity to power our network where we control the bill.
• Delivering a Mast De-Carbonisation Project to drive the landlords of third-party sites to source green electricity. In 2023, the Supplier has de-carbonised 1,128 masts.
• Transitioning our fleet of over 4,000 vehicles to electric by the end of 2030.
• Free-of-charge carbon footprint estimations for our solutions, so customers are better equipped to implement technology sustainably. Our model has been certified by the Carbon Trust.
The Supplier also aims to achieve zero waste operations and zero waste products by the end of 2025. To support this, all customers (including public sector organisations) can receive cash for trading in their unwanted devices and a minimum of 95% of this waste is recycled.Covid-19 recovery
Immediate response to the pandemic:
The Supplier’s priority during the COVID-19 pandemic was to ensure that communities were safe and supported. Actions included:
• Providing 40GB of free data a month to support home-schooling families struggling to connect during lockdown.
• Offering any customer who worked for the NHS an extra 10GB of data monthly for six months from Summer 2020.
• Partnering with environmental charity, Hubbub, to launch ‘Community Calling’, which works with 400+ local community organisations to re-distribute smartphones to people who need them most.
• Offering vulnerable customers on mobile contracts unlimited minutes and an extra 10GB of data
• Launching an Essential Broadband tariff for existing customers who receive Universal Credit, Pension Credit, Income Support, Income-based Jobseekers Allowance and/or Income-based Employment Support.
Continued support for those impacted by COVID-19:
The Supplier recognises that COVID-19 exacerbated existing economic and social challenges, and created new ones, so we’re continuing to contribute to economic recovery and support the most vulnerable. Actions include:
• Continuing to provide return-to-work opportunities – the Supplier recently announced 200 new entry-level positions being created in 2024.
• To ensure our customers can access the information they need, the Supplier offers over 60 zero-rate sites including National Energy Action, Citizens Advice and National Debtline.
• 9.7 million people are now eligible to benefit from the Supplier’s Essential Broadband tariff.
• In 2022, the Supplier provided a £400,000 grant fund to launch the Tech Lending Community. This initiative makes tablets and free data available to community organisations supporting vulnerable individuals across the UK, all while extending the life of second-hand tech.
• In June 2021, the Supplier announced its support for the ‘Together Coalition’, by offering grants of £1,000 to 400 small charities that champion and celebrate the community spirit, belonging and togetherness across the UK.Tackling economic inequality
The Supplier is committed to tackling economic inequality across the UK. This includes:
• Hiring over 2,600 apprentices since our award-winning scheme began in 2008. Our ‘blind recruitment’ process opens opportunities to those who have potential but may lack relevant experience.
• Working with organisations, such as ‘Blind in Business’ and ‘Step into STEM’ to help create opportunities for groups often facing barriers to employment.
• Supporting business creation and growth, through Wayra (start-up cohort) and 5G accelerator hubs.
• Hosting a virtual work experience programme for 14–16-year-olds, focused on driving diversity in STEM careers.
The Supplier works directly with our customers to provide employment and upskilling opportunities in their communities. For example, our nationwide network of 170+ ‘Future Careers Ambassadors’ provides support and guidance to pupils from groups traditionally underrepresented in STEM. The Supplier pays around £2.5m every year through the Apprenticeship Levy and has spent 55% of the levy to date on apprenticeships (versus a UK average of 39%).
Additionally, the Supplier has a significant focus on addressing digital exclusion since this is a key barrier to economic equality. By 2025, we aim to:
• Connect 1 million digitally excluded individuals.
• Equip 6 million people with digital skills, confidence, and tools.
The Supplier’s customers benefit from access to subject matter experts in this space, as well as our established partnerships. Our digital inclusion initiatives include:
• Partnership with the Good Things Foundation to create the National Databank, which provides free-of-charge SIMs for individuals experiencing data poverty. Since 2022, over 78,568 SIMs have been distributed.
• The Supplier’s nationwide ‘Connect More’ programme enables our employees to use their five paid volunteering days to deliver digital skills training through local authority and third-sector drop-in centres.
• As part of our ‘Community Calling’ initiative, over 18,292 phones have been re-homed.Equal opportunity
The Supplier is dedicated to tackling inequality and enabling everyone across the UK to fulfil their potential.
The Supplier’s diversity, equity, and inclusion strategy, ‘All In’, sets bold ambitions to be achieved by 2027. These are measured and reviewed regularly to ensure that the Supplier is on track.
To support ‘All In’, the Supplier has created an Inclusive Recruitment Programme to ensure our end-to-end recruitment journey for internal/external talent is fully inclusive.
The Supplier also reduces barriers through our policies aimed at providing the right support and flexibility for all employees. This includes:
• Industry-leading Family Friendly people policies which include up to 26 weeks’ paid maternity and adoption leave, 14 weeks’ paternity leave and up to 12 weeks’ paid neonatal leave, plus paid time off for caring, bereavement, emergencies, and more.
• Optimising our workplace adjustment process in collaboration with industry leaders, ‘Microlink’.
• Our ‘Work Smarter, Live Better’ hybrid working policy empowers our people to work in a way that helps them thrive.
• Integrating an ‘Adjustment Passport’ into our HR system, which provides comprehensive documentation of the accommodations provided for employees. This eliminates the necessity to divulge personal information.
• Regularly collaborating with our employee networks which represent the LGBTQ+ community, gender, disabled people, people who are neurodivergent, unpaid carers, and underrepresented ethnic groups.
• Signing up to the Government’s Disability Confident scheme and working towards achieving the Level 2 Disability Confident Leader standard.
• Attaining the 'Carers Confident' Level 1 classification and actively progressing toward Level 2.
• Funding gender transition treatment for our transgender and non-binary employees and helping them access medical care and support.
Additionally, all our suppliers must provide a Modern Slavery Transparency Statement detailing the actions they have taken to minimise the risk of Modern Slavery in their operations and supply chains.Wellbeing
Improving Health and Wellbeing:
The Supplier promotes a culture of health, education, and wellbeing so that we can support all employees, both personally and professionally.
Our ‘Thrive’ programme provides a comprehensive range of advice, tools and policies to ensure our people can be their best at work. As part of Thrive, our employees have free 24/7 access to confidential support and advice from trained therapists via Bupa Healthy Minds. Our people can also access free online treatment, such as Computerised Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.
The Supplier offers the following management development modules:
1) Stamp Out Stigma: Managers’ mental health awareness
2) Anxiety and Depression: Managers’ toolkit
3) Workplace Stress: Managers’ survival kit.
To support physical wellbeing, the Supplier’s employees are enrolled on the Bupa Medical plan from day one. Our people can even choose to extend this to their partner and/or children by paying an amount every month. The Supplier also offers a Ride-to-Work scheme to help our people improve their fitness, reduce their carbon footprint, and save money on the cost of a bike.
Personal development also has a crucial role in wellbeing, so the Supplier ensures that our people have the right knowledge, skills and behaviours to reach their full potential. We have a wealth of learning and development tools available, including unlimited access to 16,000+ online courses on LinkedIn Learning, which are taught by passionate real-world professionals.
Community Integration:
When delivering social value propositions, the Supplier prioritises collaborating with the community to help deliver a shared vision for the area. This includes partnering with the public sector, private sector, and third sector.
Additionally, all the Supplier's employees have five paid volunteering days per year to support and connect with their local communities, digitally and in person. Since 2023 alone, our people have supported over 443 charitable causes.
Pricing
- Price
- £8 to £14.50 a licence a month
- Discount for educational organisations
- Yes
- Free trial available
- No