Call Center Functionality
Resource 1 Telecom
Call Center
Depending on your Service plan, your PBX may include certain Call Center features. There are three main components of the Call Center. They are call Queues, Automatic Call Distribution (ACD), and Agents. Please contact us to see if your plan includes these features.
Queues
**Name: Enter a name to identify this queue.
**Caller ID Prefix: This determines the settings of the Caller ID display when ringing an agent's phone.
There are four options:
Original Caller ID - This displays the caller's original Caller ID name.
Custom Text Only - Enter text into the box at the right; only that text is displayed on the agent's LCD display
Custom Text: Original Caller ID - Enter text into the box at the right. That text is displayed, followed by a colon (:), followed
by the caller's original Caller ID name.
None - This displays nothing on the agent's LCD display.
**Queue Timeout: Enter the number of minutes that a caller should remain in the queue, before the call is forwarded to another location within the
PBX. To keep callers in the queue indefinitely, enter 0.
**After Timeout: If a timeout has been set in the above field, this determines where the caller is forwarded to after the timeout expires.
**Can Callers Join an Empty Queue: If "Yes" is selected, a caller will be able to join the queue, even if no agents are logged into the queue.
Otherwise, the queue will immediately time out, and the caller will be sent to the "After Timeout" setting.
**Ring Strategy: This determines the strategy of ringing agents. There are five available strategies:
Ring All - Rings all logged-in agents at the same time until one of the agents answers.
Least Recent - Rings the agent who least recently answered a queued call.
Fewest Calls - Rings the agent who has taken the least amount of calls than all other logged-in agents.
Random - Rings agents in a random manner
Round Robin - Rings agents in a round-robin manner. This provides as even distribution of calls.
**Ring Each Agent For: When sending a call to an agent, this determines how long should the agent's phone ring before sending the call to the next
available agent.
**If Agent Doesn't Answer: If an agent does not answer in the time entered in the above field, will there be a penalty?
There are three options:
*No penalty - Do not penalize the agent, just send the call to another agent. This agent will continue to receive queued calls.
*Automatically Pause Agent - Set the agent's status to "Paused" or "Make Busy". The agent will not receive any more calls until
they un-pause.
*Automatically Logoff Agent - Log the agent out of the queue. They will no longer receive calls from this queue until they log in
again.
**Wrap-up Time: After an agent finishes a queued call, how long should the queue wait before attempting to send the agent another call? (0 seconds
is acceptable)
**Play Periodic Announcements: While the caller is waiting in the queue, they will hear the hold music from your PBX. You may configure an
announcement to periodically interrupt the hold music and play to the waiting caller. You may enable or disable this
periodic announcement with this control. The following two fields determine which announcement will play, and
how often it should repeat.
**Announcement Audio: Similar to the way an auto attendant works in the system, you will record the periodic announcement into a voice mailbox
that will be used only for this purpose. Please select the mailbox into which you will record your periodic announcement
audio. Be sure to record the audio into the "Busy" greeting of this mailbox.
**How Often (seconds): How often should the periodic announcement repeat.
**Can Caller Press 0 to Exit Queue: While the caller is waiting in the queue, should they have the ability to press 0 to exit the queue? If yes, then
your periodic announcement should instruct the caller that they are able to do so.
If Caller Presses 0 - If the caller presses 0 while waiting in the queue, where should there call be forwarded to
within the PBX?
**Agents Assigned to this Queue: You must select which agents belong as members to this queue. Otherwise, the agents will not receive calls from
this queue.
Select agents from the left list, then click the "Add" button to the right list. All agents listed in the right "Agents to
Ring" list will receive calls from this queue.
Agents can be removed from the queue by selecting their name in the right list then clicking the "Remove" button.
Agents
Agents are employees of your company who have an identification number to login to their assigned queues to accept queued calls. For any person to receive queued calls, they must be first configured as an agent, and secondly, assigned to one or more queues.
1. Select the customer.
2. Click Agents from the submenu at the left.
3. You will see a list of all existing agents configured in your PBX.
4. Click on the New Agent button.
5. Complete the fields.
6. Click on the Save button.
Agent ID: This can be any number from 1 to 5 digits long. The Agent will use this number to log in and out of the queues.
Name: This is the agent's name. It will appear in the Call Center reports as entered here.
Password: The agent will use this password when logging into the queues. It may be any number from 1 to 4 characters long.
After creating the list of agents, assign each agent to one or more Queues.
Please see Queues for information on assigning agents to queues.
Agent Login and Pause
After the queue and agents have been configured, agents may login to each queue. Agents may login to multiple queues at the same time. Each queue has its own login dial code to be dialed. The login, logout, pause and un-pause dial codes for each queue can be found at the top of the Queue edit screen once the queue has been saved.
To Login to the queue(s): Agent dials *01 + Agent ID
To Logout of the queue(s): Agent dials *00 + Agent ID
To Pause in the queue(s): Agent dials *02 + Reason Code + Agent ID (see Reason Codes for more info.)
To Unpause in the queue(s): Agent dials *03 + Agent ID
Reason Codes
When an Agent needs to stop receiving calls from the queue(s), but does not want to log out of the queue(s), the agent can pause. The agent will stop receiving queue calls until they un-pause, but will still be reported as logged into the queue(s). In addition, the agent can provide a "Reason Code" to indicate the reason that they are currently paused. This reason code is logged with their pause event, and reported on the Realtime Console.
Select the customer.
Click Reason Codes from the submenu at the left.
Complete the fields.
Click on the Save button.
There are 10 Reason Codes listed. The system will have default values for each of the Reason Codes, such as "Wrap Up Time," "Restroom," "Break," and "Lunch. Any of these Reason Codes can be changed by the user. Update the textbox next to each Reason Code, and click "Save." To reset all codes to the default values, click "Restore Defaults."
Tally Codes
When an Agent receives a call from the queue(s), and needs to assign that call a specific category for billing or other purposes, the agent can provide a "Tally Code" to indicate the nature of the call. This Tally Code is logged in the Queue Call Activity Report.
There are 10 Tally Codes listed. The system will have default values for each of the Tally Codes. Any of these Tally Codes can be changed by the Administrator.
Select the customer.
Click Tally Codes from the submenu at the left.
Complete the fields.
Click on the Save button.
Queue Reports
The Call Center has 7 reports available:
1. Realtime Console Report - A real-time view of all queues showing calls waiting, hold time, and agents' status.
2. Queue Performance Report - A historic metrics report searchable by date, showing metrics by queue.
3. Agent Performance Report - A historic metrics report searchable by date, showing metrics by agent.
4. Agent Events Report - A historic metrics report searchable by date and by agent, showing agent activity by session.
5. Queue Call Activity Report - A call log report showing calls by date, by queue, and by agent.
6. Answer Abandon Report - A historic metrics report searchable by date, by queue, or by agent, showing metrics of answered or abandoned
calls.
7. Queue Summary Number Report - A historic metrics report, searchable by date, by phone number, and by queue, showing metrics of calls
inbound to specified phone numbers and queues.
Visual Status Indicators
The Call Center has the option to display the agent's queue status on the LCD screen of Polycom brand phones. If this option is enabled for a given phone, then the phone will display a screen showing the agent ID of the agent who is logged in at that phone, the agent's current status ("Logged In" or "Paused"), and the list of queues that the agent is currently logged into. If no agent is logged into a queue at that phone, the screen displays "No agent logged in". To enable this feature, the phone must be configured to display the status.