Delay Before Escalation?

[ts7420]

We are making outbound collections calls, and want to try a few times for a live answer before leaving a message on an answering machine. I have an oudial entry that retries 3 times with RetriesDelay set to 60 and OnAnswerMachine set to "retry", then an escalation entry that makes one call with an AM script set.

 

This works except the escallation call happens immediately aftrer the last call. I'd like to use the same delay of an hour between the last call and the escallation call.

 

Is this possible? Or do I have to set a much later ActivateTime? I'd really prefer not to do this to avoid capacity and timing issues.

 

Thanks!

 

[SupportTeam]

The making of escalation call immediately after the last retry failed to connect is as per design. In most uses when one phone does not answer then the user wants another phone number to be tried immediately. For what reasons do you want to delay trying to make contact on the alternative/escalated number once the previous number fails to answer?

 

You could try setting the ActivateTime to:

 

Now+10

 

where 10 can be replaced by any number (the number represents minutes). But not sure if this notation is supported for escalation calls.

[ts7420]

We are using the same number in the escalation module. We are just wanting to make a few attempts to get the person on the phone before leaving a message and "completing" that call.

 

It's just a little odd if the person ignores our call and then we call right back, but maybe I should not worry about it.

 

I will try your idea of Now+nn to see if Escallation would honor that - it would give exactly the desired effect.

 

[SupportTeam]

We are using the same number in the escalation module.

If you are dialing the same number then why don't you use the 'retries' and the 'wait time between retries' settings?

 

Is is because initially you only want to start a script if live person answers the call, but after a number of retries you are willing to leave a message as well? Or is there another reason?

[ts7420]

"Is is because initially you only want to start a script if live person answers the call, but after a number of retries you are willing to leave a message as well? Or is there another reason?"

 

Exactly. If we can get a live person on the line we offer to transfer them to make a payment. So until we have made several attempts we don't want to leave a message.

 

 

 

 

 

[SupportTeam]

Have you tried to see whether the "Now+" notation works?

[ts7420]

Yes. <ActivateTime>Now+60</ActivateTime> from the documentation did not work. I also tried <CallTime>Now+60</CallTime> from the VG Help Escallation example. It still dialed the escallation number right away.