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Investing in the right business phone line provider for your call centre business means you’ll experience a boost in your efficiency, and should give you more time to focus on your all-important customers. When looking for a new phone system to help support your call centre, there are some key components you need to evaluate.
We consider the three most important criteria to be inbound communications (the features and tools provided to help you manage incoming calls), external connections ( the software platforms you’ll need to integrate into your phone system, like help desk and CRMs), and training features (the functions the provider includes to help onboard and develop your staff).
Of course, when trying to keep overheads down, cost is going to be one of your top considerations as well. To ensure you’re able to understand the up-front and ongoing costs of a phone system, we’ve created this handy cost comparison tool, below:
- RingCentral – Best for scalability
- Vonage – Best for training tools to get your staff up to speed
- GoTo Connect – Best for international calling
- Dialpad – Best for short-term campaigns
Don’t spend unnecessarily – you can click any of the links above to begin comparing costs on call centre systems for your own business size and needs.
 |  |  |  |
| Provider | Provider | Provider | Provider |
| Pricing from £12.99 per user, per month (paid annually) | Pricing from £10 per user, per month | Pricing from Bespoke | Pricing from £12 per user, per month (billed annually) |
| Free trial | Free trial | Free trial | Free trial |
Please be aware that this list is not a definitive ranking. We have highlighted the providers we felt were relevant and have explained the features, benefits and plans that help your small business succeed
Update for 2025: Previously, we listed 8×8 on our list of call centre phone system recommendations. Recently, 8×8 have reorientated its products to be more in line with the needs of larger, or medium sized enterprises. We’ve now removed 8×8, to keep this list as helpful as possible to small businesses.
RingCentral: best for scalability
- Starting price from: £12.99, per user, per month
- A range of plans that can suit a wide variety of businesses of different sizes
- Good for growing businesses that need streamlined internal communications
- Great for customer-service focused businesses
How much does it cost?
| Essentials | Standard | Premium | Ultimate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost per user, per month | £7.99–£12.99 (billed annually) £12.99–£17.99 (billed monthly) | £12.99–£19.99 (billed annually) £16.99–£23.99 (billed monthly) | £17.99–£24.99 (billed annually) £21.99–£28.99 (billed monthly) | £22.99–£29.99 (billed annually) £26.99–£33.99 (billed monthly) |
| Inclusive minutes | Inbound: 0 Outbound: 100 | Inbound: 250 Outbound: 750 | Inbound: 1,000 Outbound: 2,000 | Inbound: 2,000 Outbound: 4,000 |
We consider RingCentral to be one of the more affordable options on the list, but one major thing to be aware of is that it doesn’t offer unlimited minutes. The Essential plan comes with no inclusive inbound minutes, whereas Standard is limited to 250 inbound minutes per user. This might be a dealbreaker for some call centres, and many of the other providers on this list (such as Dialpad) can offer unlimited calling built into its monthly price.
What makes RingCentral suitable for a call centre?
RingCentral has four phone system plans, so there’s a lot to play with in terms of scalability for your business. With RingCentral Standard, you get the option of on-demand call recording, so your staff can manually record their calls, although if you want a call to record automatically, you’ll need to upgrade to either the Premium or Ultimate plan. With the Standard plan, you also get the multi-level auto-attendant, which means every single call is answered with a customised greeting and sent to the right place. This is great for smaller call centres, where agents aren’t able to answer every inbound call.
We also found that RingCentral performed particularly well when it comes to providing customer support features. It offers 24/7 support, even at the Essentials level, so you’ll have peace of mind around the clock. This is particularly important for all-hours call centres that can’t risk a tech mishap in the early hours.
RingCentral will provide you with some decent call-screening features too, like call blocking and voicemail screening. These are crucial features for call centres that need to block out bad-faith callers so your agents can focus on high-quality leads.
Is there a Contact Centre plan?
RingCentral does offer a specific Contact Centre plan that’s separate from its other phone plans. This is a more expensive option though, starting at £52 per agent, per month. This is an AI-driven solution that includes unlimited domestic inbound and manual outbound minutes. It’s a costly option and will be aimed at slightly larger businesses that need a fully-fledged solution.
Vonage: best for training tools to get your staff up to speed
- Starting price from: £10, per user, per month
- Good low entry price plans for micro and small businesses
- Can integrate with Salesforce and Hubspot
- Solid suite of calling features at a competitive price
How much does it cost?
| Express | Core | Pro | Max | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost per user, per month | £10 | £18 | £20 | £25 |
| Inclusive minutes | None, metered use | Unlimited domestic calling | Unlimited domestic calling | Unlimited domestic calling |
Vonage provides a decent entry-level pricing option for SMEs with the Express plan costing just £10 per month. It’s worth keeping in mind, though, that this is charged on a metered basis, so you don’t get inclusive inbound or outbound minutes. You’ll need to upgrade to the mid-range Core or Pro options for unlimited domestic calling, and these plans can be pretty pricey when compared to competitor options.
What makes Vonage suitable for a call centre?
What’s good about Vonage is that it offers a good range of plans and there’s opportunity for scalability. You can start on the cheap, metered Express tier, but then upgrade to the more expensive plans when your call centre starts to grow. The Express plan gives you the basics like caller ID, call blocking and some analytics and reporting. If you want more, though, it’s the Pro plan that comes equipped with call centre-friendly call management tools like on-demand call recording, unlimited call queues, and virtual receptionist functionality.
Vonage Pro will also equip you with all the tools you’ll need to make sure your staff will be trained properly. You’ll get access to call recording, call monitoring, analytics, and even advanced training tools like whisper and barge. Call centres tend to have a rapid turnover of staff, so having a good range of training tools can be vital.
You also have the choice of upgrading to the Max plan, which Vonage refers to as “all the bells and whistles”. More specifically, it’s talking about the Vonage Integration Suite and company-wide call recording function. Max is also the only Vonage plan to support CRM and help desk integrations, which could be pretty crucial for many call centres, so keep this in mind when selecting your phone system. If you want a lower-cost plan that still supports a solid range of integrations, we recommend looking into RingCentral instead.
Is there a Contact Centre plan?
It’s worth noting that in addition to its Unified Communications phone plans, Vonage also offers a suite of Contact Centre products. These are provided on a quote basis only though so there’s no listed pricing.
GoTo Connect: best for international calling
- Starting price from: £18, per user, per month
- Good for medium-sized businesses to unify their communications
- Helps communication between businesses in different locations
- Compatible with over five brands of desk phone
How much does it cost?
| GoTo Connect Phone System | |
| Monthly cost | £18 per user |
| Inclusive minutes | 1,000 minutes shared across all users |
GoTo Connect doesn’t publicly list its pricing structures, instead they provide costs on a quote basis. We’d recommend comparing this quote against the other providers’ pricing plans to get an understanding of value for money.
Regardless of this, though, we have to flag that with all GoTo Connect’s plans, you only get 1,000 free minutes shared across your account, which might limit its suitability for a lot of call centres.
What makes GoTo Connect suitable for a call centre?
GoTo Connect’s Phone System has a pretty standout feature, which is free calling to over 50 countries. This is a great tool for any call centre that’s doing a lot of inbound sales calling overseas. Just be aware though that this is only included on specific plans, so just make sure it’s part of your package!
GoTo Connect comes packed with a lot of great calling features that will help streamline your call centre workflow. For example, it provides smart call routing which allows your calls to be sent to phones in a specific sequence, so you’ll never miss a customer call. It also includes customisable drag-and-drop dial plans, so you can map out call flows.
If your call centre is operating all hours, then you’ll need to know you can get help day or night if your system goes down. Luckily GoTo Connect can provide 24/7 customer support, which could be crucial for businesses with non-traditional working hours.
Is there a Contact Centre plan?
Along with the Phone Systems plan, GoTo Connect also offers the Contact Center plan, an AI-driven software solution. With the Contact Center plan you automatically get everything included in the Phone System and Connect CX plans, along with sophisticated features like AI Chat Analysis and real-time reports.
Dialpad: best for short-term campaigns
- Starting price from: £12, per user, per month
- Good for small businesses who need help managing high call volumes
- Compatibility with four types of desk phone
- Can intregrate with Salesforce, Hubspot, and Zendesk
How much does it cost?
| Standard | Pro | Enterprise | |
| Cost per user, per month | £12 (annually) £22 (monthly) | £20 (annually) £28 (monthly) | Bespoke |
| Inclusive minutes | Unlimited calling | Unlimited calling | Unlimited calling |
Dialpad isn’t what we’d consider to be a budget option – its entry-level Standard plan is pretty costly at £22 per month, and the Pro tier is just under £30 per month. While it’s not the cheapest option, you do get some first-rate call management features for your cash, and you also get unlimited calling. This is why we consider it a solid option for a short-term campaigns, but you may need to look at other options, such as RingCentral, for a longer-term solution.
What makes Dialpad suitable for a call centre?
Dialpad excels in call management. We found that it was on par with GoTo Connect for the amount of features it offers. With multi-level auto-attendant, customisable call routing, three-way calling and call forwarding, it offers plenty of tools to help make sure your staff are on top of incoming calls.
You’ll get access to 24/7 live support. Though it’s also important to note that you only get CRM and help desk software integrations with the Pro and Enterprise plans. So if you’re planning on integrating software like Zendesk, Salesforce or HubSpot into your call centre operation then skip the Standard plan and go straight for Pro.
One thing to bear in mind with Dialpad however, is that the Standard and Pro plans don’t come with an uptime guarantee. Only the most expensive Enterprise plan has a guaranteed SLA of 100%. If you want an uptime guarantee, but don’t want to pay for the Enterprise plan, we’d suggest looking at a different provider on our roundup, as they all provide SLA’s at all plan levels.
Is there a Contact Centre plan?
Along with its phone plan options, Dialpad also offers Dialpad Support, a separate AI Contact Centre solution. However, this is aimed mostly at larger, more well-established, businesses that want AI support and live coaching. The plans are very expensive, with even the lowest tier starting from £65 per user, per month.
Our methodology
Our Startups team has evaluated the providers using their own independent analysis and expertise, in conjunction with the in-depth and rigorous research that has been carried out by our dedicated insights team.
We’ve focused on the providers we felt best represented the three most important categories we determined for a call centre phone system: inbound communication features, training features, and integrations. This is not a ranking of the best providers, but a selection of those we felt were most relevant, alongside the standout features they provide.
As we highlighted at the beginning of this article, when searching for a new call centre phone system the most important areas to research are inbound comms, external connections, and training features. These are all key considerations for call centres because you’ll typically receive a large number of inbound calls, alongside regular new hires who need to learn the ropes fast. There’s the integration of existing software to think about too.
Below, we’ll take a closer look at some of the tools that are important to have within these three main factors.
Inbound communication features
Firms operating within customer service tend to deal with large levels of inbound calls. A virtual receptionist feature, for example, ensures a caller is immediately engaged with the company and can have a big impact on customer satisfaction.
Training features
Training employees is an important aspect of working at a call centre. Centres tend to have larger teams with a high staff turnover that, without proper management, can lead to a disorganised and poorly supported team of new starters.
External communication features
Call centres have a lot of software requirements. Finding a phone system that can integrate with your existing tools, such as a CRM system, is important to ensure you’re not wasting money on software subscriptions that don’t complement each other.
Regardless of our opinion, you should always compare call centre software providers before signing on the dotted line. The last thing you want is to be stuck in a contract with a service that doesn’t fulfil the needs of your business.
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