Live Receptionist

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
April 17, 2023
1 reply
1 view

We have not made the jump to VOIP yet but considering Zoom Phone. When the office is open, we answer the calls live (No auto attendant). After x rings, if no one picks up it will go to voice mail. Non-Biz "Night ring" / "Auto Attendant" is activated and calls go to the auto attendant, where they can leave message in general mailbox, go to a particular extension etc.

1) Is there a way to do live answering vs. auto attendant Menu answering all calls, when open?

2) Is there a manual way to set when the business is open? Like via a programmed button on phone? I am thinking of times when office closed for weather or someone gets in late and no one avail to answer call(s) yet.

3) Is there a way to set a special closed message in the event of an outage, snowstorm, etc to let people know? How is that set?

Best answer by sachinzoom

oh, then it is like AR's being created in parallel. Makes sense. My mind wasn't thinking that way. I was thinking building out a tree from main account -> single AR -> multiples Queues. or Man Account -> AR1 -> AR2 ->AR3 and off those AR's were the queues.

Curious, is there a way to duplicate an AR? Thus, copying the same Opening and closing HR's and everything call handling but then can just add different cal Queue, so you don't have to recreate the same basic setting then for each number or group of numbers that would be part of these "parallel / top level" AR's?

Hi @imt

Yes you can duplicate the ARs and even form templates if you plan to build multiple ARs ( under Company Info -> Settings -> Templates -> Select Auto Receptionist )

If this response helps, please accept the answer as an accepted solution, so others can benefit as well.

S

sachinzoom

Community Champion | Employee

Hi @imt

Welcome to Zoom Community. The answers below:

1. Yes

2. Answer is yes but instead of a programmed button on phone, it will need to be done via the zoom portal by the AutoAttendant manager ( Auto receptionsts can be assigned a manager )

3. Yes again using the Web Portal

If this response helps, please accept the answer as an accepted solution, so others can benefit as well.

I

imtAuthor

Newcomer

Thanks for the quick reply.

In dong some reading here on other posts. Am I correct that:

For #1) basically creating an AR that does nothing but forwards to a call queue during the open hours, where the receptionist(s) are part of to answer the calls live? Then set timeout after x amount of time to go to voicemail for Queue if no one answers?

For #2) is there a link for a support article that describes how this is done?

Lastly, I figure you can create an IVR for "closed hours" to dial a users extension (if known), direct to a particular VM (Sales, etc) or general mailbox. But... What about pressing a number on the IVR tree to "Get Directions". or some other static message? In our current PBX I think these are called fantom mailboxes. Can only listen to a message (not leave one) and then can press a key to go back to main menu or dial like 0 to leave a message in general mailbox. Is there something similar in Zoom Phone and if so what is it called? Tried searching for support article on this.