The Company

Focom Ltd have been in business since 1996. During that time we have become recognised as one of the leading telephone call logging suppliers in the UK. Our customers cover a wide range of sectors: financial institutions; retail; local government; education; or health. Our average system installation is four sites with 2,500 extensions.

We are a service orientated company set in the leafy heart of England. A small friendly office of happy people keen to help you. It sounds idyllic but it’s true. Our aim is to provide Telecomms Managers with the best tools they could have to manage their system.

Our Help Desk is second to none. If you ring with a query you will get straight through to someone who can help you.

If you have a particular requirement and need something more from your call logger or directory, or if you want a telephone system evaluation, then we are the people to talk to.

"A highly technical, friendly, helpful staff supporting an excellent product."

Bob Carr, Dixon Stores Group

"I chose Focom Ltd because they impressed me as a progressive group of people who were willing and able to give me exactly what I wanted and not what they wanted to give me. Time has more than justified that decision."

Brian Salisbury, McCain Foods (GB) Ltd

"Focom Ltd are a joy to work with, their incredibly efficient logger leaves the 'competition' standing."

Bill Banks, Prudential Bache

"The approach from Focom Ltd is one of confidence in reaching the goal and a technical support team who have a proven track record in the industry."

Peter Bonken, The Chase Manhattan Bank

"MIRA chose LUMBERJACK call logging because it offered more of the features needed than any other package considered."

Mike Dallaway, MIRA

"LUMBERJACK call logging has been the most powerful tool in my armoury. It's saved me money."

William Flaherty, Knight Securities

"From cost to usage. A simple, user-friendly tool that I am ever reliant upon. This LUMBERJACK is certainly OK!"

Malcolm Neate, GMAC

"We chose Focom Ltd partly because of a can-do approach, and have found the staff to be approachable and helpful with queries and problems. The range of available reports far exceeds our requirements, and we expect the system to be able to respond flexibly to our changing needs."

Jenny Bulman, The Royal Society

Of our Bureau Service:

"Focom Ltd won the contract to manage our call logging bureau requirement for twenty or so sites around the UK. This has proven to be a well managed, friendly and efficient service freeing up valuable staff time."

Steve Pepper, Innogy

Of our Help Desk:

"I am very pleased with the support we get from Focom Ltd. It is very relaxed and seemingly unofficial. It is most refreshing when you have confidence in the people you are dealing with."

Joe King, Bayer

In January 2002 we achieved the Investor in People award. This was a lot of work but greatly added to the efficiency of the company and clarity of purposes.

Back row: Tony, Andy, Professor Laurie Taylor, Donna, Sam, John Collier
Front row: Joan, Lesley, Julie, Nikki
Professor Laurie Taylor, writer and broadcaster, presented the award
John Collier, Director of Business Services for Herts Business Link, hosted the event

Focom Ltd were keen to adopt the Work Life Balance policy whereby staff can work from home should the need arise. Many of our staff have young children who may be sick or off school. Rather than lose a day's holiday, the WLB scheme encourages people to work from home.

In Summer 2002 we were awarded a grant by the DTI to investigate our options.

In the photograph and Sarah (with Tilly) and Andy are in Focom uniform with Helen Merrhing (left) of Hert Business Link who has done so much to help us improve our internal company policies.

• Ever had to 'book' a service call? If you are sitting at your system and have a problem, you want it resolved NOW! If you are having problems with your Help Desk, call ours (01442 20 00 02) and see the difference in response times.
• We believe that better service makes you, the customer, look better, too. Remote diagnostic support gives you immediate benefit and keeps down the costs generated by engineer call outs. Sometimes, all you need is a little "hand holding".
• Ever been told that you have lost all your old data because the system was 'designed' to overwrite old records with the new stuff? Wouldn't it be nice if the system had let you know it was filling up, instead of arbitrarily deleting your call records?
• Were you fleeced when the millennium bug reared its head? We believe that such mistakes should not be charged to the customer.

• A company bought a system for a particular feature, only to be told that the feature is an optional extra and he needed to buy an additional module.
• A company purchased a system capable of logging multiple sites, only to find that this meant installing a stand alone system at each site.
• A company upgraded to the latest software, only to find they had lost functionality.
• A company bought a multi-user system, only to find that each user had to dial in to the server via pcANYWHERE instead of having integrated Web browser or client/server operation.

Donna Pickrell, Sarah Glavin and Andrew Miller met in 1993 whilst working in the call logging environment. At that time the call logging systems available were extremely basic and most of them still DOS based. But the Windows® revolution had taken hold and become the standard in most office environments. Customers wanted Windows based telephone call logging systems. The best most suppliers could provide was a Windows front end on an old DOS or Unix box. There was a very evident hole in the market.

More than that, however, was the realisation that the box shifting mentality was dead. Managers wanted service along with the systems they were buying. What they wanted was a call logger utilising the latest technology and, most importantly, backed up by top class customer service and support.

Hardly rocket science but considerably more than a spreadsheet package!

By May 1996, Sarah and Donna found themselves in a position to set up a company offering bureau services and analysis to customers. This was encouraged by a number of experts in the field. They spent much of their time designing the ultimate call logger, taking into account the wish lists they had heard over the years from their extensive experience in the market. Andy later joined them to head the technical development of the company and Focom Ltd took off.

Software does not stand still. Since the original LUMBERJACK system was beta tested, it has moved with the times and demands of the new Comms Manager. Additional reports, new modules and, of course, the Web interface, so necessary in business today. LUMBERJACK has been joined by a sister package, CATALOG. This is our directory and information database. For busy managers, we still offer our bureau service, now marketed as RETREEVER.

The R&D team know that work will never be completed as new innovations are always just around the corner. We keep up to date and, just as we did in the beginning, we try to anticipate our customers requirements and give them the right tool for the job.