PORT TOWNSEND — A bottleneck in the Port Townsend School District’s newly installed phone system could be resolved this week, a CenturyLink representative said.
The district began the school year Sept. 3 with what it expected to be an improved communications infrastructure that incorporated Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) that was intended to improve access both within the school district and for the public.
Three weeks into the school year, the internal communication is working perfectly, according to Superintendent David Engle, but the public still cannot easily access school numbers because they have not been ported from one vendor to another.
“In many cases, orders aren’t completed because the right boxes aren’t checked,” Jan Kampbell, CenturyLink’s public relations and market development manager for Western Washington, said Friday.
“We will be making calls directly [today] to determine the problem.”
The school district changed its phone provider this year from CenturyLink to Jive Communications, of Orem, Utah, in an effort to modernize its communication system.
Everything was completed except the porting of about 90 district numbers, Engle said.
He said those numbers had remained under CenturyLink’s control despite the district’s request to release them.
The new system will cost $55,600 for the 2014-15 school year, about $8,000 more than the previous system, “for much-increased capabilities,” said finance director Sara Bonneville.
The district also paid $3,400 for 10 high-use phones and four sets of conference equipment. The 164 basic phones cost the district nothing.
Kampbell could not say where the communication breakdown occurred, adding that if the online forms aren’t filled in correctly, the order will not go through.
She said that once the school’s contract was terminated, CenturyLink’s communication channel was directly with Jive, which was responsible to issue
It is not standard procedure for CenturyLink to contact Jive, Kampbell said, but the company will do so in this case to quickly resolve the matter.
“Porting is a complicated process” said Paige Guthrie, a creative lead at Jive in an email Sunday.
“In recent days, Jive has seen additional engagement from CenturyLink specifically with regards to the Port Townsend school account.
“We welcome the increased involvement on behalf of our mutual customers, and look forward to CenturyLink releasing these numbers to Jive Communications in a timely fashion.”
There is no time frame for the port, but once the orders are properly filled out, it can be accomplished “in about a day,” Kampbell said.
The district’s new system allows easy teleconferencing and call transfer and the ability to send voice messages as email — all of which school staff is already using.
But external calls are often stuck in a voicemail loop that results in dropped calls, according to district Secretary Mary Colton.
Eight lines are now functioning for external calls, with callers allowed to input an extension to be routed to a specific staff member, although voice mail for individual staff members has not been set up.
Those dialing directly, which the district has touted as one of the advantages of the new system, now get a busy signal.
The school system previously purchased its phone service from CenturyLink but put out a new bid this summer since its equipment was outdated and could no longer be maintained.
Jive won the bid and set about installing the new system in July for a targeted online date of Aug. 1.
While the system was tested internally, the porting of the individual numbers was not completed.
Engle said the district made repeated requests of CenturyLink to complete the port but received no response.
Jive also issued its own requests but was also unable to get a response from CenturyLink, Colton said.
Engle said he filed a complaint with the Federal Communication Commission, adding it was acknowledged but not acted upon.
The active numbers at this time are the main number, 360-379-4500; the superintendent’s office, 360-379-4501; the business office, 360-379-4604 or 360-379-4520; Port Townsend High School; 360-379-4511; Blue Heron Middle School, 360-379-4540; Grant Street Elementary, 360-379-4535 and human resources, 360-379-4602.
________
Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.