With 15 sites running across LANs and WANs, Peter Fawkes, manager of information services at the city about two hours west of Sydney, implemented VOIP to leverage the 18-year-old existing PABX network.

Fawkes said the previous Permitted Attachment Private Line (PAPL) phone system was difficult to manage as the entire system was administered from a single dedicated 'super' handset with a tiny, four-line LCD text display.

"Every time someone moved desk, we needed to make physical changes to cabling," Fawkes said. "The VOIP network has allowed the council to reduce telephone costs, while simplifying the running of the system."

While Fawkes agreed adopting VOIP could reduce international call costs, he said it would be used primarily between sites.

"The [VOIP] system will be used through the existing [IP] network mainly between our facilities as we can assign extensions to each site," he said.