> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.getsmartalex.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Enterprise FAQ

> Procurement-grade answers to the questions enterprise buyers ask before signing.

<Info>
  Grouped by topic. Short answers with links to the detailed page for each.
</Info>

## Security

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Where is our data stored?">
    Primary storage is in Europe for South African and EU customers, North America for US customers, Asia-Pacific for APAC customers. All customer data is encrypted at rest with AES-256. See [Security & Compliance](/telephony/security-compliance).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Are call recordings encrypted?">
    Yes. AES-256 server-side encryption in object storage.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Who can access our recordings?">
    Only users in your workspace with the correct role-based permission. Support staff do not have routine access to customer recordings. Access events are logged.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is consent captured for recording?">
    Recording can be disabled per agent. If recording is on, most customers configure the agent's first message to disclose it. POPIA and GDPR acceptable with appropriate notice.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How are credentials managed?">
    SIP trunk passwords are stored in a hardware-backed secrets vault. Never logged. Never visible to support staff. Rotatable on demand.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Do you have SOC 2?">
    SOC 2 Type I is in progress. Type II is on the roadmap. Compliance attestation available to Enterprise customers on request.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Are you HIPAA compliant?">
    Not currently certified. Medical practice customers in the US should consult their compliance team. SA medical customers are typically governed by POPIA plus HPCSA guidance, which SmartAlex aligns to.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is PCI scope a concern?">
    No. SmartAlex does not process or store cardholder data. If your AI agent captures card information for a separate payment flow, design that flow with PCI scope in mind.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can you provide a pen test report?">
    Yes, under NDA on Enterprise plan. Third-party penetration tests are commissioned annually.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Voice quality

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="What codec priority is used?">
    G.711 u-law first, G.711 A-law second, G.722 HD third. G.729 available on request.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is there echo cancellation?">
    Yes, built into the SIP ingress. Works in conjunction with your PBX's echo cancellation; usually only one side should apply it to avoid double-processing.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What's the expected MOS?">
    Above 4.0 in normal network conditions. Measured per call.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What's the typical mouth-to-ear latency?">
    Under 250 ms for most paths. South African customers connecting to European ingress: typically 120 to 150 ms.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How much packet loss can it tolerate?">
    Up to 1% packet loss is compensated via PLC (packet loss concealment) with no audible degradation. Above 3% becomes noticeably choppy.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Does the AI handle accents?">
    Yes. The AI is trained on a wide range of English accents and handles South African, British, Australian, American, and Indian English naturally. Very heavy regional accents may require prompting tweaks.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Call handling

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Can the AI detect voicemail?">
    Yes. The `detected_voicemail` tool fires when the AI recognises a voicemail greeting, and optionally speaks a configured message before hanging up.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What's the maximum call length?">
    300 seconds default, configurable up to 14,400 seconds (4 hours) per agent.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What happens if the caller says nothing?">
    Silence timeout (30 seconds default) triggers a prompt: "Are you still there?" A second silence triggers graceful hangup.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can callers press digits for account numbers?">
    Yes, DTMF receive is supported. The AI can prompt for DTMF input and capture it.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How many concurrent calls can an agent handle?">
    Configurable per trunk. Default 10, maximum 1000. Each agent can serve all concurrent calls simultaneously.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Does the AI remember repeat callers?">
    Yes, if CRM integration is configured. The AI can look up a caller by phone number and personalise the greeting and routing.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## IVR and receptionist replacement

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Can it replace our DTMF IVR?">
    Yes. That's a primary use case. See [Replacing Your IVR](/telephony/replacing-ivr).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can it still send DTMF to downstream systems?">
    Sending DTMF from the AI is on the roadmap. Today, if you need the AI to punch digits through a downstream IVR, that's not supported.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can it handle multi-language conversations?">
    English is primary. Limited support for other languages via voice configuration. Contact us for specific requirements.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we keep our human receptionist as backup?">
    Yes. Common deployment pattern: AI handles first touch, transfers to receptionist for anything it can't handle.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Integration

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Does it work with our PBX?">
    If your PBX speaks standard SIP (RFC 3261) and supports REFER (RFC 3515), yes. See the [integration guides](/telephony/overview#pick-your-phone-system).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can it transfer to external numbers?">
    Yes, via the PSTN transfer flow.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can it queue calls?">
    Transfers to your PBX queue work. SmartAlex doesn't implement its own queue; it uses yours.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Does it integrate with HubSpot / Salesforce?">
    Yes via webhooks and the MCP server. Pre-built connectors for common CRMs are available via the [Integrations](/integrations) section.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we write custom tools?">
    Yes, [Custom HTTP Tools](/guides/http-tools/overview) is a Power Tools add-on that lets the AI call your own HTTPS endpoints mid-conversation for routing, lookups, or availability checks. HMAC-signed, rate-limited, SSRF-guarded, full observability log.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is there an API?">
    Programmatic access is currently delivered via the [MCP server](/mcp/overview), connect Claude, Cursor, or any MCP-compatible client. A public REST API surface is on the roadmap; [contact support](mailto:support@getsmartalex.com) if you need direct HTTP access.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is there MCP support?">
    Yes. SmartAlex is available as an MCP server for integration with AI assistants. See the [MCP](/mcp/overview) section.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Observability

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Can we see call recordings?">
    Yes. Admin users can download recordings from Call Logs.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Do we get transcripts?">
    Yes. Every call has a full transcript, searchable in Call Logs.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Is sentiment analysis available?">
    Yes. Each call is tagged positive, neutral, negative, or flagged.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we export to our SIEM?">
    Yes on Enterprise plan. Syslog, JSON over HTTPS, Splunk HEC, Datadog supported.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What metrics are available?">
    Call volume, duration, transfer rate, resolution rate, sentiment distribution, per-agent comparisons, cost per call. See [Observability](/telephony/observability).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Real-time dashboards?">
    Yes, in the SmartAlex dashboard. Also via Prometheus metrics endpoint on Enterprise plan.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Billing

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="How are minutes billed?">
    AI-talking time is billed per-minute. Post-transfer time is on your own telco contract (no double-billing).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Volume discounts?">
    Yes on Enterprise plan. Talk to your account manager.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What if we exceed our plan's minutes?">
    Overage is charged at the plan's per-minute rate. Configurable caps available to avoid surprises.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Are there phone number costs?">
    If SmartAlex provisions DIDs for you, yes. BYO-carrier customers pay their own carrier directly.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## SLA and support

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="What's the uptime target?">
    99.9% monthly. 99.95% and 99.99% available on Enterprise. See [Capacity & SLA](/telephony/capacity-sla).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What are the support hours?">
    Standard support 08:00 to 18:00 SAST weekdays. 24/7 on-call for SEV-1 and SEV-2 incidents on Enterprise plan.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What's the incident response time?">
    SEV-1 (platform-wide voice failure): 15 minutes. SEV-2 (regional or partial): 30 minutes. Full SLA in [Capacity & SLA](/telephony/capacity-sla).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How do we escalate issues?">
    Email support for standard issues. Enterprise customers have a named account manager and escalation path.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Deployment

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="How long does setup take?">
    10 to 15 minutes for the technical integration if you have PBX admin access. 2 to 4 weeks for a production rollout including pilot, parallel run, and cutover. See [Migration Playbook](/telephony/migration-playbook).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we pilot before committing?">
    Yes. Most customers run a 2-week pilot on a test DID or after-hours routing before cutover.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we parallel-run?">
    Yes. Common patterns: after-hours only, overflow from busy, or single-DID test. See [Migration Playbook](/telephony/migration-playbook).
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we port our existing numbers?">
    Yes, subject to carrier cooperation and typical porting timelines (7 to 21 business days in SA). Bring your own carrier if you don't want to port.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="What if we want to roll back?">
    30-second rollback: revert your PBX inbound rule to the previous target. The SmartAlex trunk stays configured but idle.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Data and AI

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Is our data used to train a global model?">
    No. Customer calls, transcripts, and knowledge bases are not used to train any shared or public model. Your data is yours.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Where is the knowledge base stored?">
    Encrypted at rest in the same region as your other data. Scoped to your workspace.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="How does the AI stay current?">
    Knowledge base can be updated any time. Changes take effect on the next call. Google Search grounding is available for external facts.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can we opt out of AI features?">
    AI is the platform. The telephony layer is the PBX integration and routing. Those can run without AI via simple scripted flows, but that's not the primary product.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Something missing?

Email `support@getsmartalex.com` with your question. We'll answer, and if it's common enough, add it here.