FAQ
Q: What notification volume do I need to become a Surgent customer?
A: A typical Surgent customer logs anywhere between 15,000 minutes a month to upwards of 1.5 million minutes a month.
Q: How does pricing/billing work?
A: Pricing tiers start at 1.5¢ per minute for DTMF (touch-tone) input and pre-recorded voice prompts and go up to 7¢ a minute for more complicated solutions including automatic speech recognition and text-to-speech, answering machine detection and interactive capabilities. Discounts from stated rates may be available for high monthly notification volume.
Q: How long has Surgent provided such services to the market?
A: Surgent Networks LLC was formed in January 2011 by Newfound Communications, Inc., a leading provider of call recording, interactive voice response (IVR) and dialing solutions for the telecommunications industry. While Newfound Communications was sold to Bedford, Mass.-based Acme Packet Inc. (Nasdaq: APKT) in early 2011, Surgent Networks, a privately held company, currently provides enterprise-grade voice messaging solutions and application hosting services for customers transacting thousands to millions of interactions per month. Additionally, Surgent offers custom IVR professional development services, and is the single source for VXML compliance testing in connection with IEEE/VXML Forum.
Q: What makes Surgent’s service better than what else is out there?
A: Best-of-breed technology, technical expertise and reactive support.
Q: What is Surgent’s messaging platform built on?
A: Our platform is built on industry leading voice technology from Nuance Communications and Voxeo Corporation.
Q: Can I get integrated whole call recording with the interactive notification solution?
A: Yes. Surgent can provide integrated whole call recording which is helpful for customer service quality assurance and/or compliance purposes.
Q: Is SlingShot only offered as a hosted notification solution?
A: Surgent offers the SlingShot outbound notification solution most effectively in a hosted environment; however, should you require an on-premise installation we are open to discussing your requirements.
Q: How quickly can I get an outbound messaging campaign up and running?
A: If using our Web Dashboard, you can be up and running in a matter of minutes. For API-based integrations, a longer setup time may be required.
Q: Do you provide 24 x 7 technical support for your hosted customers?
A: Yes we do, and we use an industry-leading Cloud-based ticketing system to track and respond to your technical support needs.
Q: How would I notify technical support of a question/issue?
A: Surgent customers may submit tickets via voice or e-mail, or may simply log onto the Surgent support portal to enter their support issue. Once submitted, customers receive an immediate confirmation of receipt and the ticket is then assigned to the most appropriate technical resource for resolution.
Q: Where is Surgent’s hosting facility?
A: Surgent uses the most secure and redundant collocation facility in the Northeast with one of the largest IP backbones available. Surgent customers benefit from 24×7 security & system monitoring, redundant climate control & power, TDM/SIP connectivity for high capacity inbound/outbound voice, and redundant connectivity to ensure system uptime.
Q: Can Surgent help design my solution?
A: We are experts in designing, delivering and operating voice- and Web-based applications. Our team takes a consultative approach using an efficient Agile process to deliver robust & dependable software on-time and on-budget.
Q: Do I need to know VoiceXML to utilize Surgent’s services?
A: No. We have all the VoiceXML expertise you will need, and our intuitive user interfaces allow your technical operations staff the ability to easily manage, maintain and monitor your notification campaigns.
Q: Do I need technical resources on my end to utilize Surgent services?
A: No. One of the main benefits of becoming a Surgent hosted customer is that you don’t have the ongoing burden of managing and paying a team of technologists to maintain your own system. Our well-trained and professional staff are here to get you up and running and keep you up and running. Best of all, on-going technical support is included in your per minute fee!