Another Phone Line Needed?

[Guest jamesrrdaniel]

Hello,

 

I'm a complete newbie when it comes to IVR. I'm trying to set one up for a very small business.

My specs is: 1 analog line. The IVR system will just have a menu of:

1) location

2) hour

3) services

0) operator (handled by 1 or 2 operators)

 

 

From what I've been reading, it seems like telephony card is greatly recommended, so I do plan to buy one.

My first question is, which telephony card do you recommend? The ones you recommend are all 4 analog in/outs, are there 2 or 3?

 

2nd question: In case of the option 0, operator, How many telephone numbers do I need? I'm a little confused on this part. Right now I have 1 analog line, but that will be going into the computer. Do I need another 2 in order for 1 for the computer to use as a dialing and other one to pick up that phone call? Or do I just need to hook up the analog line to the computer and a telephone to the computer?

 

3rd question: Is it possible to have two telephones being the operator? If one is busy, let the other pick up.

 

 

4th question: related to 4th. If a customer calls, and another tries to call, will the line be busy?

5th question: Queuing. If one/both operator is busy, still allow the menus to be read and then if they want an operator, put on hold with that waiting music on. Is that possible with this software? What extra specs would I need?

 

6th: Which licensing do I need? (Please give me two quotes, 1 with just 1 operator and the 2nd with 2 operators)

 

 

I know I asked a lot of questions. Sorry about that, but Thank you so much!

 

[SupportTeam]

which telephony card do you recommend? The ones you recommend are all 4 analog in/outs, are there 2 or 3?

The smallest card has 4 ports.

 

Do I need another 2 in order for 1 for the computer to use as a dialing and other one to pick up that phone call? Or do I just need to hook up the analog line to the computer and a telephone to the computer?

A common approach in these situations is to have a phone attached in parallel with the line going into the Dialogic card. Then have the phone's ringing sound turned off so hat you do not hear it ring every time a new call arrives. When the caller selects to speak with operator have VoiceGuide play a sound file over it's speakers. When that sound file is played then the operator can pick up the phone and speak to caller.

 

3rd question: Is it possible to have two telephones being the operator? If one is busy, let the other pick up.

You'd need to use a PBX for this, and setup a PBX to have a 'hunt group'. The transfer calls to the 'hunt group'. In this scenario the external phone line would go to the PBX, and PBX would need to be setup to send all incoming calls directly to the extension plugged into VoiceGuide.

 

If a PBX is used then VG can transfer calls from it's extension to the operators extensions or hunt groups, just like a normal transfer.

 

Once a call is transferred the IVR port is free to accept another call, however the external incoming line is still busy with the caller speaking to the operator, so no calls will arrive until that caller finishes the call.

 

4th question: related to 4th. If a customer calls, and another tries to call, will the line be busy?

Yes. a phone line can only handle one call at a time. You would need to two phone lines to handle two external calls.

 

6th: Which licensing do I need? (Please give me two quotes, 1 with just 1 operator and the 2nd with 2 operators)

Professional 1 line license should be enough. If you need for IVR to handle two calls at the same time then you'd need a 2 line license.

 

[Guest jamesrrdaniel]

Thank you for the responses.

 

Ok, maybe the two operators might be too complicated.

But, I'm still interested in allowing the customers be in queue.

When you call a big company, they give 1# to a lot of people. But, when even when multiple callers call the same # the line isn't busy. And then when multiple callers want to talk to a limited amount of operators, they get placed in a queue. How do you achieve this?

 

 

 

Thanks again!

 

[SupportTeam]

First of all you will need an incoming phone line for every active call.

 

Then the calls can be parked in a queue until a person(s) is free to speak to them. This is called an ACD system. You can implement an ACD system with VoiceGuide, but this requires use of CTI integration with the PBX.