SAN JOSE, Calif., Dec. 3 /PRNewswire/ -- Virtual PBX(TM), inventor and leading supplier of hosted PBX services, today announced the December 07 release of the Virtual PBX Service. New features in the release include VPBX SmartID(TM) an all-new, next generation Caller ID service, and the VPBX Recording Manager(TM), which allows easy recording, upload, and management of a full library of Auto-Attendant greetings for every client.

The new VPBX SmartID(TM) feature goes beyond the standard Caller ID function and adds customizable digital displays and verbal information about the purpose and nature of each call. Traditional Caller ID merely shows the originating phone number of an incoming call. With VPBX SmartID, business professionals can easily see and hear when an incoming call is a business call rather than a personal call, find out what business it is for, and know what function inside the business has been dialed, such as sales, support, or customer service.

The new VPBX Recording Manager helps Virtual PBX customers maintain and manage a library of automated greetings used to answer incoming phone calls. Using VPBX Recording Manager, the company's customers can easily add new greetings to their systems, assign separate greetings to different business numbers, and change the greeting manually or automatically.

"The introduction of the VPBX SmartID functionality is a major step forward for harried knowledge workers," said Jonathan Spira, CEO and Chief Analyst of Basex, Inc, who has written extensively about the problem of interruptions and information overload. "Knowing what an incoming call is about before answering helps employees manage priorities and reduce interruptions."

VPBX SmartID(TM)

Most phone services simply pass the originating phone number of a call. Virtual PBX clients now have the ability to see if the incoming call is a business call routed through Virtual PBX, a business phone number that was dialed or a personal call dialed directly to their phone. In addition, when the call is picked up but before the caller is connected, users can hear the caller ID of the originating phone, especially helpful when their current phone has no caller ID display. Additional benefits include:

-- Displaying the number of the business being called (useful for entrepreneurs who run more than one company) -- Knowing what department in the company is being called -- Quickly assessing whether an incoming call is a business or personal call -- Sending the company's business number during outbound calls no matter what phone is being used to make the call -- Overriding blocked numbers

"We've made Caller ID much more powerful," said Greg Brashier, vice president of marketing for Virtual PBX. "Our VPBX SmartID feature, an industry first, is bringing a new level of business intelligence to our customers. It is highly customizable and can provide different benefits for differing needs. For example, our clients can assign a prefix or suffix to be displayed with the caller ID information for each call that comes through our system. When they see a caller ID number with the prefix or suffix, they know who is calling, and that it's a business call. We can even tell them whether the call was for sales, support, or another function, so they can be much better prepared before they pick up the phone."

All of these options and more can be managed for the company as a whole or by individual employees to fit their own personal needs.

"This is a terrific new feature," says Bob Werbach, President of First Interview Company "I use my cell phone for both personal and company use and hate to be interrupted for personal calls when I'm in the middle of important business. Virtual PBX lets me know whether each call is a personal call or a business call."

VPBX Recording Manager(TM)

The new VPBX Recording Manager gives clients the ability to manage, upload, record, and order Auto-Attendant greetings for their systems. Now customers can keep an entire library of greetings and switch between them at will. Greeting selection can be done manually, whenever needed, or automatically by daily schedule, such as a different greeting after business hours. The VPBX Recording Manager will help businesses immediately communicate new information, such as changes in business hours, holiday schedules, or current promotions. Different recordings can be used to greet callers on different lines, so a sales promotion might easily be added to a sales line, or special instructions given to calls to support. Recordings can be added to the system instantly by phone or upload at any time.

"The level of customization allowed by the VPBX Recording Manager is unprecedented," said Cavett Binion, owner of INKIRK, "and the functionality is world class. It works flawlessly, accommodates instant modifications, and is simple to use. Sophisticated business users are going to love it, and more casual users will see a MUCH richer feature set than they can find with commodity providers. I have extensively evaluated every hosted PBX supplier in the industry. Virtual PBX's competitors should be sweating."

The December 07 release is available now to all Virtual PBX clients at no additional cost.

About Virtual PBX

Virtual PBX.com(R), Inc., pioneered the hosted PBX market, introducing the first product of this class in 1997. Virtual PBX utilizes the public service telephone network and the internet to provide PBX functionality as a hosted service. The three primary uses for Virtual PBX services are in small businesses that want full PBX functionality without the capital and support expense of installed equipment, companies of any size that need to route calls to telecommuters or other employees outside of a main office, and enterprises looking for phone system disaster recovery solutions. Additional information about Virtual PBX can be found at http://www.virtualpbx.com/.

Media Contact: Bryan Ferraro/Corey Oiesen Dovetail Public Relations (408) 395-3600 VPBX@dovetailpr.com

Virtual PBX, VirtualPBX.com, and PBX Parachute are trademarks of VirtualPBX.com, Inc.

CONTACT: Bryan Ferraro or Corey Oiesen, both of Dovetail Public
Relations, +1-408-395-3600, VPBX@dovetailpr.com, for Virtual PBX

Web site: http://www.virtualpbx.com/