Fax over MPLS network

[elvislives]

We are having problems faxing to some of our locations over MPLS. Does anyone have any information. Our sp manages the MPLS so there isnt much I can look at. Any ideas?

 

[plshlpme]

is your fax device tagging the packets properly to be in the nrt class of service?
actually do you have QOS and if so are you or the provider responsible to tag accordingly?

 

[elvislives]

plshlpme - thanks for responding. Is this something I can check on the fax machines? Yes, we do have QOS, wouldnt the provider be checking the tag already?

 

[plshlpme]

hard to say..
if you are putting fax into the NRT class.. then they should be able to tell you that they are receiving packets at that class..

as i said earlier it depends on what your contract is with them.. but usually the customer is responsible to do the tagging..

you may want to have them check their qos and make sure you packets are being sent int the priority queue.
do you have voice issues at that site as well?

 

[elvislives]

I'm sorry what is a NRT class? If they manage all of the MPLS shouldnt they be responsible for the tagging?

Actually , we dont have any voice issues at all. We have had instances when our LD was down and other locations couldnt get through to us, which means something was wrong with MPLS.

 

[plshlpme]

well in my case we manage the MPLS.. but the customer is required to tag their traffic accordingly before they pass it to us.. our qos will then route the traffic accordingly..
we dont decide what traffic is voice or not based on ip. we do it based on the precedence tag.

is your voice all voice over ip? do you have PBX's at each site?
there really are alot of different ways your site could be configured depending on provider and the service that you have from them..


sorry NRT is near real time.
you may not even have a near real time class of service.

These questions really should be asked to your provider though so that you can understand both of your responsibilites to ensure that it is working as designed.

 

[elvislives]

We have Avaya PBX's with a Trunk group that goes over MPLS to our core locations.
Thanks for your help , I really appreciate it.
What questions should I be asking our sp? I understand how MPLS works but because I cant see any of it and I dont work with the routers etc, it's hard for me to know what to ask. Thanks again!

 

[plshlpme]

well if everything is going through your pbx, usually the tos bits are set on the pbx itself.

i would just ask your isp to verify that the qos is being applied properly and that they see your "voice" or "nrt" class incrementing counters.

i think fax is very sensitive and you may not see/hear problems normally that would effect a fax.