How Important is Voice to Your Business?

In today’s digital-first world, organisations are rethinking their communications and telephony service to increase efficiency, save costs and reduce complexity. Unified Communications (UC) is the answer to this need, blurring the boundaries of telephony and merging it with instant messaging, video conferencing and a plethora of different applications, such as CRM systems, contact centres, and reporting.Since its release in 2017, Microsoft Teams has significantly impacted the UC market thanks to its ease of use, free inclusion in most Microsoft business licenses, and slick desktop integration. In the past six months, mostly due to the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak and the subsequent uptake in remote working practices, Teams’ daily users have skyrocketed, increasing from 44 million in March 2020, to 75 million as of April 2020 .

As an integral part of Microsoft 365 E3 and E5 business licences, many organisations have chosen Teams as their preferred collaboration solution. With its free instant messaging, voice and video features, Teams is a no-brainer for businesses looking to simplify their internal communications. However, the solution opens a lot of questions for organisations considering it to support the telephony needs of the whole business, and how easy and cost-effective it is to implement.

How important is voice to your business?

The enterprise communications ecosystem is broad and complex. While instant messaging, content sharing and virtual meetings are becoming increasingly popular amongst employees, voice is still key to wider business operations. According to Zendesk, 68 per cent of customers prefer to communicate with a company via phone, with only 34 per cent choosing chat as their preferred channel2. Therefore, having the right UC solution is vital to make sure your customers receive the best service possible, while also increasing efficiency and operability within your organisation.When considering the best UC solution for your business, it is critical to first understand your business requirements and how these compare to the solution’s capabilities. Out of the box, Teams supports voice over IP (VoIP) calls to any other member of the business using the application, but it does not connect to your telephone network. This means that in its most basic form, Teams can only be utilised as an internal collaboration tool, while you will also have to retain a separate telephony solution for external calling.For organisations struggling to cope with too many ineffective internal communications tools, Teams offers the perfect single point of contact to enable collaboration across the business. However, Teams’ basic functionality will not provide the telephony features of a PBX, such as contact centre functions, queuing, and interactive voice response (IVR), that might be necessary to the wider business and that would be available with a fully integrated UC solution.

integrated UC solution. Moreover, minutes bundles cannot be shared nor carried over, and your organisation will require communications credits if you run out of minutes in your calling plans, or if you receive toll-free calls. In this instance, an empty communications credits balance would stop you from making calls altogether. To overcome this issue, Microsoft suggests setting up an auto-recharge amount with a minimum balance that will trigger a purchase for that recharge amount3 – a recommendation that could easily promote bill shock if you’re not keeping track of the additional expenditures. Microsoft Direct Routing is a more flexible, accessible, and cost-effective alternative to Microsoft Calling Plans, enabling users to make and receive calls using your existing telecom provider. This option is particularly beneficial to leverage existing contracts with service providers, and to ensure interoperability with on-premise telephony equipment and desk phones. Moreover, while Direct Routing’s costs depend largely on the carrier rates, it is fair to say that it will almost always cost less per user than Calling Plans, with many providers offering unlimited and flexible minutes bundles.

Conclusion

At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, many organisations adopted Microsoft Teams as the easiest option for their sudden remote working requirements. However, many are now re-evaluating their long-term communications strategy to understand which solution is best for business continuity and permanent remote or flexible working. While Teams is integrated into most Microsoft business licences as an internal collaboration platform, enabling external calls requires additional costs, including Microsoft Phone System licence and minute bundles. Microsoft Calling Plans and Direct Routing differentiate in terms of cost-effectiveness, number of suppliers, and flexibility of bundles. Alternatively, organisations might also want to consider adopting a fully integrated UC solution from a different single supplier.Ultimately, the solution you choose primarily depends on your organisation’s current and future needs, such as whether want to retain your current carrier, whether Teams has all the features that your business requires, how important an end-to-end SLA is to your business, and how much additional costs and complexity you’re willing to take on.

Want to know more?

Tel: 01603 481995
Web: www.mayday-online.co.uk
Email: itsupport@maydayit.co.uk

www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software

Protect Your Business Emails

PROTECTION FOR YOUR MAILBOX…

With our Email Security, you can be safe in the knowledge that you’ll never lose any essential email traffic. Avoid the nasty pitfalls of increasing spam to your mailbox with the An-ti-spam and Anti-virus features, which block 99% of all incoming spam. Plus, it’s enhanced by Disaster Recovery and full archiving options, giving you peace of mind when it’s needed the most.

With our Email Security you’ll also benefit from:

  • NO SOFTWARE INSTALLATION
  • INTERCEPTION BEFORE REACHING YOUR SERVER
  • UP TO 1 YEAR OR 10 YEARS ARCHIVING
  • NO INVESTMENT IN FIXED ASSETS/HEAVY HARDWARE
  • ENABLE ON A PER-MAILBOX BASIS
  • 99% ENTERPRISE-CLASS EMAIL FILTERING
  • FULLY-HOSTED SERVICE
  • TAKES EFFECT TO YOUR ACCOUNTS IMMEDIATELY

INCREASED PROTECTION

Our Email Security adds an increased layer of protection against spam and virus threats, ensuring that over 99% of spam is identifi ed and removed before it reaches your mailbox. Not only this but any spam is quarantined for 14 days, meaning that you can inspect and resend any messages that you wish to receive.

FIRST-CLASS EMAIL SECURITY

Email Security archives all inbound, outbound and internal email for up to 10 years,resulting in easily tracked and safe corporate mailboxes. Your emails are indexed, compressed and securely archived in real time at twin geographical independent data centres. You are also able to view and retrieve eachemail independently or group thousands by date, providing you with the tools to recover archived emails quickly and easily back into your mailboxes.

Want to know more?

Tel: 01603 481995
Web: www.mayday-online.co.uk
Email: itsupport@maydayit.co.uk

Mayday Join’s The GOGODISCOVER Trail 2022

Proud Sponsors of “GoGoDiscover2022”

Following the massive success of “GoGoHearo” part of the “GoGoHares2022” Mayday are happy to announce we will once again be sponsoring Break Charity’s “GoGoDiscover” Trail event this year! (2022). All the designs and details have been done and our little bundle of joy is currently in his cave being painted as we speak, it’s going to be a “Rawesome” Adventure that’s for sure!

So much more to be announced along with dedicated social media accounts so make sure you head over to “PopTarts” Social media feeds for regular updates.

Search “PoptartUK” on Instagram and Twitter.

Visit https://www.break-charity.org/gogodiscover for details on all the sponsors for the event and more.

Who are Break Charity?

Break is changing young lives across East Anglia by supporting children, young people and families in four key areas: young people in care and moving on; children and young people with disabilities; families in need of support and children at risk.

The charity was started back in 1968 by Geoffrey and Judith Davison and their friend Leslie Morley to provide holidays for children and young people with disabilities which would give their parents a break too. They chose Norfolk as a great place to have a holiday.

Working in partnership with Norfolk County Council and Cambridgeshire County Council, Break runs seven family-sized children’s homes providing safety and stability for children and young people who, for whatever reason, can no longer live with their own families.

On behalf of Norfolk County Council, Break provides residential assessments for families whose children are at risk, giving families the opportunity to prove that they can keep their children safe from harm. We also provide community-based assessments on a spot purchase basis.

For children and young people with disabilities, in partnership with Norfolk and Suffolk

County Councils, Break provides short breaks, giving the family a chance to recharge their batteries and the young people the opportunity to join in with fun activities. These services are based in Norfolk and Suffolk.

Families’ House, which joined Break in 2012, has an established reputation for supporting families with a wide range of difficulties in Norwich and Norfolk, including support for families who are “parenting apart”.  Families’ House also provides a Young Carers Project.

Jake Humphrey, sports presenter, has been Break’s patron for several years. He is an invaluable asset to the charity, spending as much time as he can meeting our young people and families. He is passionate about Break and we are grateful for everything he does for us.

Visit: http://www.break-charity.org for more info.

Looking to save money in your business? We CAN help!

Visit: mayday-online.co.uk

Mayday Proud to Introduce Supply of Thermal Imaging and Temperature Screening Solutions.

Following the global pandemic of Covid-19 Mayday Office Equipment Services are proud to announce from today we will be supplying temperature screening and thermal imaging solutions to assist with detection of high temperatures allowing both old and new customers to take quick and preventative steps to avoid spread and stay safe in these uncertain times.

Some of the key features of these thermal cameras and handheld screen solutions are as follows:

  • Allow screening for multiple targets at the same time.
  • Audio alarms and instant notifications and screenshots via smart devices and email if high temperature detected.
  • AI face detection.
  • Non contact camera allowing temperature measurement from 1m away.
  • Real time video of thermal and optical channels.
  • High accuracy of up to ± 0.5°C.

Thermal Screening technology can be used in a variety of scenarios from airport security, entrances to workplaces, public houses, football stadiums, schools and venues to name just a few.

Further details on what thermal imaging is and what products are available are listed below.

If you are interested in discussing this product further and seeing how Mayday can assist, contact us today on: 01603 481995.

 

 

If you are interested in discussing this product further and seeing how Mayday can assist, contact us today on: 01603 481995.

Top 5 Interesting Facts About Stationery

We love stationery, it’s why we sell it! So a list of some of the most interesting facts about those random pieces of equipment you use in your everyday working environment sounds like a great way to show you why!

Below is our top 5 interesting facts about stationery! Enjoy!

1. Pencils can write underwater.

It’s true! We tested just to prove the theory. No idea what the need for this would be but an interesting fact none the less.

2. Before erasers were invented, stale bread was used to rub out pencil marks 

Next time you are walking around Sainsbury’s and think to yourself “I made a mistake writing doughnuts on the shopping list” and you don’t have an eraser to hand, well pop over to the bakery section, grab yourself a loaf of hovis and away you go!

3. Yellow highlighters account for around 85% of all sales

As yellow is in the middle spectrum of visible light, yellow ink highlighters work really well for people with colour blindness and this is one of the biggest reasons for the high quantities of yellow highlighters ordered.

4. Pen lids cause an average of 100 deaths a year

How many times have you been told off by a teacher or employee for chewing on a pen-lid? Here’s why! To help people breathe, many pen manufacturers now put holes in the pen lids to help prevent choking.

5. Pens are 5,000 years old!

Ancient Egyptians used reed straws with ink made of soot or red ochre pigment mixed with beeswax or vegetable gum. Almost as impressive as the pyramids we’d say!

Want to find out more about stationery and how Mayday can help your business? Get in touch today: 01603 481995 or drop us a message.

5 Ways You Are Loosing Sensitive Documents When Printing

In world full of data protection and “GDPR” it’s more crucial than ever to ensure you are protecting sensitive information, printing is one of the most common causes of data leaks within the office environment, some you might not even realise you are doing.

So take a look below at the top 5 ways you are loosing sensitive documents when printing.

1. Leaving them in the printer tray. 

You know that stack of documents lying on your printer? That’s wasteful. But it’s a threat too. In that stack might be someone’s pay review, your customers’ data or your company’s financial plans and roadmap.

If you don’t want that stuff just lying around, make sure your printer’s smart enough to authenticate your users before it prints out their documents.

Looking for a smarter printer? Get in touch today: 01603 481995 or drop us a message.

 

2. Sending files without password-protecting them.

You need to scan a file and send it to your colleague John. You’re in a hurry. So you scan the document really quick and mail it to John – the wrong John. Oops.

Get yourself a printer that helps you password-protect files.

 

3. Saving the sensitive files in an unsafe folder. 

When someone needs to scan a document and then save it to the cloud, they usually need to save that scanned file somewhere local first.

It might be their desktop or some local folder. But if they forget to delete that file after copying it to a shared Dropbox or Google Drive or wherever, you’ve got a problem.

Make sure you’ve got a printer that’s smart enough to automatically save your users’ files in the cloud for them. And they won’t leave sensitive files lying around.

 

4. Getting someone else to print for you.

Sometimes remote workers need something printed before they come in. A common way around this is to ask someone else to print the file for them.

But if they save that sensitive file in an unsafe place, you might be in trouble.

If your printer supports mobile printing, your remote workers won’t need to go through someone else to print their files. And this won’t be a problem.

 

5. Leaving the data on the printer’s hard drive. 

You probably don’t think of your printer as a computer. But the smartest printers have hard drives and they’re central to the way information flows through your company.

So make sure your printer automatically overwrites its own hard drive for you. More important, make sure the printer’s disk is well encrypted too.

 

Want to find out more about smart printing? Get in touch today: 01603 481995 or drop us a message.

 

Are you using your photocopier to it’s FULL potential?

Are you using your photocopier to it’s FULL potential?

So the little workhorse that sits in the corner of your room today has more potential than you may think, a lot of suppliers forget to mention some of the little handy features these machines have, from printing banners, to sending faxes to an email addresses. Today, we are here to give you 5 great features you never knew your photocopier had!

Banner Printing

Did you know it is possible to print pages larger than A3 on your photocopier? Many manufacturers these day’s supply a feature called “Banner Printing” Taking a very long landscaped image (Similar to the one below) and being able to print this via the machines bypass tray.

Image result for ricoh banner printing

Fax Forwarding

With the modern office moving away from older technologies such as fax and moving towards a more digital path many companies still receive documentation via a fax machine or option placed on their photocopier, with many devices there is a feature where you can divert the fax from being printed to be sent as a JPEG/PDF to a specified to a network folder or email address within the company. Helping reduce waste and energy.

Watermarks 

What if we told you that your photocopier can print letter-headed paper for you? Save money on having headed paper printed by a third party printers by doing them yourself, with features such as “Watermarks” you can use them for more than just overlaying text like “Copyright” or “Confidential” and instead add your own overlay images to the pages.

Custom Home Screens (One touch short cuts) 

Many modern printers use “Smart” panels these days looking very similar to your Android or Apple devices, giving more functionality by moving the “Apps” around the screen, adding custom wallpapers etc but these panels also have the ability to create jobs and save them as shortcuts on the home screen. If for example you had to photocopy a booklet which had stapling features, page numbers etc it can be frustrating having to remember those settings next time round. Many devices these days have the ability to programme those settings as a pre-set and add it to the home screen of the photocopier. Helping reduce time, frustration, notepads the lot!

Print and Copy Tracking

 Last of our handy features is probably one of the best! Did you know you can lock your photocopier down with a pin code so you can monitor the volume of jobs being photocopied or printed on the device? As a standard feature many machines have the ability to set restrictions to help manage or charge users for the printing they do, this can be a very handy feature to help bring down those costs. However we should mention that although this feature is free, it’s limited on it’s functionality in most cases, generally it would be recommended to use “Print Management Software” Such as “Papercut” which gives a vast amount of flexibility from using swipe cards and bio-metric scanners to log into the machines to detailed reporting or adding filters and restrictions to force double sided documents, duplicates, archiving, word filtering.

– To learn more about Papercut click here.

That’s it!

– We hope you enjoyed this little insight, there are so many more amazing features today’s printers and photocopiers can do, if you’d like to learn more tips, tricks or helpful features drop us a message or call: 01603 481995

Mayday Design and Sponsor 2019/2020 NCFC Matchday Team Sheets

Following on from an incredible 2018/2019 season for the canaries, we are proud to announce that for the second year running Mayday are sponsoring the 2019/2020 match day team sheets for Norwich City Football Club, the design on the Mayday artwork and the team sheet’s where completed by our in house graphic designer and visual effects artist James Vivian 

“It is again an honour to have been given the opportunity to design the team sheets and motion graphics once again for Norwich City and Mayday”

               – James Vivian

Along with the team sheets Mayday branding will be displayed throughout Carrow Road including a brand new animated graphic displayed on the pitch side LED screens.

Follow us on social media for updates and photo’s of our graphics in the upcoming premiership matches.

Twitter | Instagram | Linkedin | Facebook

 

 

 

 

 

 

Top 5 Facts You Didn’t Know About Photocopiers

It all started when Chester Carlson, a patent attorney, started looking for ways to make his job easier. He found his job painfully unbearable because of his arthritis. This is the box that everyone doesn’t know they rely on until it breaks down! “The Photocopier”. Here are five fun facts you probably didn’t know about that little device sitting in the corner of your office.

1. Colour Copiers Helped Make Disney’s 101 Dalmations 

The Haloid Corporation sent 7 colour copy machines to Disney in the late 50s. These copiers were used in the production of 101 Dalmatians. Haloid became Xerox, in honour of their best selling product.

2. FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!

Did you know tat the Xerox 914 has a tendency to overheat and burst into flames after extensive use? Xerox had to give out a free fire extinguisher with each machine?

3. “Butt” of the joke!

Though it might seem like a hilarious idea when you’re smashed at the Christmas party, dropping your trousers or skirt, sitting on your photocopier and pushing the green button can lead to problems. In fact, 20% of all copier repairs are required due to damage caused by somebody’s rear-end putting too much pressure on the glass. Want to avoid a very embarrassing call to your help team? Stay out of the copier room when the drink starts flowing in your workplace.

4. Arthritis Inspired the Invention of Photocopiers

There’s a good chance you know Chester Carlson invented photocopying back in 1938. What you might not know is Carlson was driven to research the process after spending years as a law student and patent attorney, re-writing legal documents by hand. Carlson had chronic arthritis, meaning each and every word he transcribed caused him terrible pain. What’s more, when Carlson first began shopping his invention around the big hardware companies of the day he was universally rejected. Why, asked companies such as IBM and General Electric, would anybody want a machine that can copy when they already have carbon paper? Carlson had to take his idea to the non-profit Battelle Memorial Institute, who backed him to research the technology

5. Remember to wipe

Did you know that 60% of all discarded hard drives from digital document systems, be they copiers, faxes or MFDs still contain data. When you consider the amount of highly sensitive information that runs through the average office on the average day, the danger should quickly become apparent. The message: make sure to erase all images and files from the system before getting rid of your device.

We hope you enjoyed these five interesting facts. If you’re looking for a new business photocopier, look no further than Norwich based photocopier specialists: Mayday Office Equipment Ltd. We lease and sell a range of quality machines, including photocopiers from Toshiba and Ricoh.

Click here for our product library.

Mayday Selected to Join “Future 50”

It’s with great pleasure we can now confirm that Mayday Office Equipment Ltd has been selected to join the cohort of 60 businesses (previously it has always been 50) as the ‘ones to watch’ in 2019 throughout Norfolk and Suffolk.

What is Future 50?

Future50 is an exciting business growth programme that’s designed to recognise Norfolk and Suffolk’s most innovative companies. To find the region’s ‘ones to watch’ and to accelerate their growth ambitions through inspirational keynote events that stimulate peer learning, collaborative discussion groups, exposure in local media brands and business support from key partners and their network. Future50 members will be the individuals and companies that will be creating jobs, growing at a faster rate than others and that have the drive and ambition needed to be leaders in their sector.

Future50 is delivered across Norfolk and Suffolk by Archant, with partners Barclays, Birketts, Lovewell Blake, New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership and UEA adding ongoing support throughout.

Want to find out more? Visit the link below.

https://www.edp24.co.uk/business/future50/future-50-2019-cohort-norfolk-and-suffolk-1-6050314