Quality Tools and Services, Inc.

An Activant Professional Services Success Story

Features

E-mail This Page

Activant Helps Louisiana Distributor Get Up and Running on VPN in Less than a Week and Save Hundreds Monthly

Jeff Baham got the news when he read his e-mail at an Internet cafe in Rome, Italy, during a European vacation. Back home, his 56K leased line provider was out of business - and communications between the main office of his distributorship, the Hammond, LA-based Quality Tools and Services, Inc., and its branch location were terminated.

Challenge:

Help a Hammond, LA-based industrial equipment supplier quickly replace an expensive 56K leased line with a new method of communications

Solutions:

Activant
Professional Services:
Technical Consulting

Benefits:

Reduced costs by $500 monthly
Increased opportunity for growth

"I grabbed a couple of Italian beers, went back to my hotel room, and called my staff," he remembers. "Thank goodness I have great people. They were already setting up damage control procedures."

He directed his staff to contact Quality Tools and Services' Activant Inside Sales Representative immediately. Within minutes, one of his employees was on the phone, arranging to put a Virtual Private Network (VPN) in place.

A VPN is a network of secure, encrypted connections over a public Internet Protocol infrastructure. With a VPN, you don't need to maintain costly frame relays or point-to-point leased lines between your corporate office and branch locations. A VPN provides an affordable, secure, and reliable alternative to most distributors' current connectivity.

Within a week, and just three days after Baham returned from Europe, Quality Tools and Services was up and running on its own VPN. Baham now counts the incident as a blessing in disguise.

"I'm saving about $500 a month with the VPN," he testifies. "Instead of paying for the 56K leased line every month, I'm only paying for my DSL - which was already in place." Plus, Baham can also use the VPN to connect new branches, which he plans to open shortly, to Quality Tools and Services' main location. "Now that we have a VPN established at the main office, our costs for adding additional branches will be minimal," he says. "We won't have to pay $500 a month for each location."

"I would definitely recommend a VPN to another distributor in search of a cost-effective way to connect branches," Baham concludes. "It's worked beautifully for us since we put it in place," he says.

For more information on Activant's enterprise software solutions, please fill out our Web Contact Form.