Raymi Refurbishes Office Phones At Standard Tele

Thursday 12 November 2015 I was all day visiting and talking social media marketing for office phone networks at Standard IP Telecom with John Conn the CEO and Founder at their headquarters on 33 Laird Dr just south of Eglinton. Not that their address matters much as Standard Telecom doesn’t have walk-ins, or even a YELP profile.  They sell to businesses who need new phones or better phones or cheaper phones for their employees, and those types of consumers definitely shop online these days.

John is a Nortel Networks expert who consults, designs and sells both new and used phone networks. There’s a sweet spot in this business for refurbished phones sold at half the cost of new units, and you know they’re just as good – equally reliable. But alas they need to be cleaned and polished and that’s what I did for five hours… er I mean five minutes (five seconds?).

John refurbishes obsolete Nortel Networks phones especially, and turns around and installs perfectly good and highly reliable phone systems for GTA offices. Standard Telecom is the future – they have a good business model that’s better for the environment, their client’s wallets and all of society . The end consumers , office workers, can’t even tell the difference because the guys at Standard Tele so expertly refurbished the phones.

John showed me some of their secret techniques. This entire experience was intriguing to me esp because I don’t work in an office and generally assumed nobody uses land lines anymore or even talks on the phone. What a surprise.  I’m like wow these things still exist? I thought it was all texting, voice-to-text and emails but as usual, I was wrong. Newsflash – Canadian businesses still use these clunky old office phones all the time, but these days they’re largely relying on VOIP – Voice Over Internet Protocol to save long distance costs and better interface with their computers and devices.

Here is a handy video detailing VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and how that works. My attention span was really put to the test, and I’m sure yours will be too but its not very long and that’s not the only good news. John’s a good narrator. Visuals are great when attempting to grasp anything so thank you for this, John.

Heading over to the office phone workshop, things became a little more crystal clear…

…how tech savvy I am for example in fact John was like, “Raymi, PLEASE work here with us ALL THE TIME!”

Mohammed was behind that idea (job offer) too and I was like sure, got nothing better to do lol.

This was fun. Everyone has phone nostalgia. Office lighting is really flattering too.

I paid close attention to everything John had to say at all times. I am amenable as much as I am punctual.

Not to be height-ist or anything but tall employees are ideal. Tall employees with long arms as seen here. “Sure Mohammed, I’ll get that Cisco for ya in a jiffy!”

Raymbo is on the case! I dropped these on the floor later on ha ha. You can break these things. Ten Nortel Phones That Never Die!

Office politics already?

There’s going be big changes around here like a vending machine for instance. Better office lighting, and I can do all the social media I want plus take apart phones and reconstruct them into transformers-frankenstein-like creations that somehow work.

33 Laird has many other businesses located within the building I’m sure I’ll make friends quick.

I get to answer the phones in funny accents. I’m working on some really obscure ones.

If you receive any crank calls it has nothing to do with us.  How To Tell If Your Office Phone System Is Hacked?

I do my best active-listening (learning) if I look straight ahead and don’t make any eye contact with the speaker because then I start studying their face and get distracted don’t hear anything … Folding my arms into an imaginary straight-jacket also helps contain my ADHD.

A camera we use has a bizarre rapid-fire art setting okaaaaaaaaay.

John went to the gym after this. I can tell.  And he told me he was going to do that. Installing office phones is physical work though – he leads an active life.

He’s really passionate about what he does. And he gets so excited when someone anyone shows even a modicum of interest in the subject.

Fun with phones!

later he had to cool down in the kitchen

Together we enjoyed the coldest cup of water in the city at that moment. John said he filtered it then boiled it and I sarcastically said then you put it in a plastic container…..

Til next time!