This page relates to inbound and houses all your inbound numbers on the system. Here you can 'point' those numbers at specific IVRs to allows bespoke routing of calls. You can also use this page to initiate 'emergency routing' should it be required. This page is usually setup as part of onboarding but you may add more numbers to your system in the future which will require configuring here.
Select the images for a more detailed view.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- The Inbound Number page
- Page options
- Table
- Wildcard inbound numbers
- Emergency routing
- Enabling/disabling Emergency Routing via the Portal.
The Inbound Number page
Fig 1. To get to your inbound numbers, choose ADMIN > under TELEPHONY > INBOUND NUMBERS
Page options
Across the top of the page you have some options to change the view of the page.
Fig 2. Emergency routing and page options highlighted at the top of the screen.
| Activate all emergency routing | This option will toggle emergency routing on or off. See further down the article for more information on how this works. |
| Refresh | To ensure all created campaigns, lists, IVRs and tags are visible, you may need to refresh. This is because items not created when loading the page will not be visible without refreshing. |
| Tag Manager | If you have the tagging feature enabled on the system, you will see this option. This allows you to jump to the Tag Manager page to edit/create tags which can be assigned to inbound numbers. |
| Add | Clicking here will add a row to the table, allowing you to add and configure an inbound number. |
| Filter | Selecting this option adds filter options to the table. This allows you to start typing/changing options to filter the rows. Particularly useful if you have lots of inbound routes. Fig 3. The filter options visible for each column. |
| Save | Selecting this will save any additions or changes made to the page. |
Table
Fig 5. The filter options visible for each column.
| Details | |
| Telephone no* | Enter the telephone number you wish to assign to a destination. Bear in mind a valid telephone number is required with no spaces and starting with either 0, a two digit country code or an asterix (*). |
| Description | Enter your preferred description for this number. E.g. 'main inbound' or 'customer services number'. |
| Reserved Until | Here you can select a date to reserve the number until. Entering a date will lock the editing of this entire row until the date has passed. Any user with the 'Inbound Numbers - Number Reservation Override' permission will be able to edit this entry but all other users will not. You will see a red padlock and the line will be greyed out if a number is reserved and you don't have permission to change it. |
| Campaign(s)* | Select the campaign that calls to this number will be associated with. This is important when it comes to reporting as calls to this number will be recorded against this campaign. A campaign is always required. |
| Tags | Here you can assign specific tags to the inbound route. For more on tagging, see this guide. |
| Destination | |
| List* | Select the default list that calls to this number will be associated with. This is important when it comes to reporting as calls to this number will be recorded against this list unless overridden by other settings. If a call to this number isn't matched to an existing lead, a new lead will be created and added to this list. Don't forget other system settings will effect the script that is presented to your users. A list is always required. |
| IVR* | The IVR determines where calls to this number will be routed by default. Don't forget, you are selecting the IVR start element here (The actual IVR name will appear in brackets) If you cannot see your IVR, it may be that it doesn't yet have a start element included. An IVR is always required. |
| Emergency | |
| I.C.E route | Select an IVR route for calls to take if there is an emergency situation. See this guide for more information on this. |
| Enable | With the toggle on, any calls to this number will route down the emergency route selected in the I.C.E. column. |
| Status | |
| Active | This is a handy way to quickly tell which numbers are currently active and those which are not. You may see an alert icon here, this is a warning for when you have emergency routing enabled. It is telling you that the number does not have an emergency route setup, so it will continue to follow the default route settings. |
| Routing | Icons displayed here will inform you of which numbers are active and their status. See the bottom of this guide for options. |
| Record Calls | This toggle allows you to control if inbound calls to this route/number are recorded or not. Bear in mind, this setting will be impacted by settings at a higher level and lower level. If System Level Call Recording is disabled, changing this setting will have no impact on calls being recorded. If this setting is enabled, other system settings will impact if calls are recorded. |
| Controls | |
 | To make it easier for you to access information not visible in the table, an info icon in the 'Controls' column allows you to hover over to view detailed information about reserved numbers (if any). |
 | Clicking the edit icon will open a modal that contains all fields related to the number. This allows you to conveniently manage and update the details of your numbers, including the reservation details. If the number has been reserved, you will not be able to access this unless you have the relevant permission to override them. |
 | The red bin icon will delete the inbound number and all options associated will be removed from the row. You will receive a confirmation dialog box upon selecting the button. If the number has been reserved, you will not be able to access this unless you have the relevant permission. |
Wildcard inbound numbers
To ensure you don't miss any of your customer calls, and you have full visibility of all contact attempts to your business, you can setup a "wildcard" inbound number entry. This is as simple as adding a * entry in your Inbound Numbers page to capture any calls made to your platform that are not specifically calling a number listed in your inbound numbers.
Example
A common reason for your customers calling numbers that are not in your Inbound Numbers page is when an inbound number is removed from this page, either accidentally or because it is no longer in use. In this event you may have customers attempting to reach you on those numbers and a * entry will ensure calls to those numbers still get to you.
Numbers can start with a * followed by digits such as *123 and any calls to numbers ending 123 will work. Likewise, a numbers surrounded by *, such as *123* will allow numbers containing 123 at any point, to work.
When you set up the * entry, you can then choose where to route these calls. This will allow you to report on, and handle the incoming calls that are not mapped to a specific inbound number.
If you would like any assistance setting this up our Support team can configure this for you in just a few minutes. Please get in touch with us on 0330 159 6565.
Emergency routing
In the event of an emergency situation, you can tell the MaxContact system to route inbound calls to a specific IVR.
Use case example
Users are in the office and have to evacuate the building due to an emergency/there is a major outage and inbound customers need to be informed.
There is no need to repoint each inbound number to an emergency/out of hours message. All inbound calls can be quickly routed to an emergency message by a member of the team (with access to the inbound numbers page).
The emergency routing option is a one click feature to activate, once configured, and can be switched off again by one click on the inbound numbers page.
You can create different emergency routes for each of your inbound numbers E.g. A customer with multiple campaigns may want to route their calls to specific emergency messages for each campaign. "Thankyou for calling about PRODUCT A, unfortunately..." "You've reached PRODUCT B customer services, unfortunately..."
In order to activate emergency routing, you will need to have an emergency route set up for your inbound numbers.
This is done by creating an Emergency IVR (or multiple depending on your requirements). These IVRs must have a start and hang-up element but the content of the IVR can be different based on your requirements.
Examples include,
- Relay a message to the customer via a 'Text to Speech element' or a pre recorded message via a 'Play element'.
- You could create an IVR which allows the customer to leave a voicemail.
- The virtual queue option could be given to the customer so they can leave their number in the queue and have someone ring them back once users are back on the system.
- If you have multiple sites and only one has an emergency, you could always route the customer to a different queue.
- Its also possible to have the emergency route transfer the customer to another number outside of the MaxContact system.
Creating an emergency number
To set an emergency route, simply select your prebuilt IVR for emergencies in the 'I.C.E. Route' column dropdown.
Fig 1. Select an emergency route for your inbound number.
Enabling/disabling Emergency Routing via the Portal.
There are 2 ways to enable emergency routing via the portal.
- Enable on individual inbound numbers.
- Enable on all inbound numbers.
Enable on individual numbers.
To enable on individual inbound routes, simply toggle the Emergency Enable option on for the required lines.
|
|
Fig 2. No inbound routes set to emergency routes.
Fig 3. Inbound route set to emergency.Enable on all numbers.
If all inbound numbers need to be pointed at their emergency route, rather than switching them on individually, you can switch them all with one click.
 | In the top left of the inbound numbers page there is button which will switch all routes to their emergency route. |
 | Upon selecting the button, you will be presented with a dialog box to confirm if you would like to activate emergency routing or not. Click the OK button and all routes will switch to their emergency route. |
 | Once confirmed, the buttons state will change to show as fully red, indicating emergency routing has been activated. |
 | To switch emergency routing off, simply click the button again. This will then give a dialog box to confirm the action. Upon clicking OK, emergency routing will be switched off for all routes. |
Note. If you activate emergency routing on all numbers then deactivate one of the numbers individually, the button will revert back to its original state, as not all inbound routes are set as emergency routes anymore (Essentially its like you manually set each as emergency except one).
 Fig 4. All emergency routing off. |  Fig 5. All emergency routing on. |
Status > Routing column icons
 | You will see an alarm icon appear when emergency routing is switched on for an inbound route. |
 | Denotes route is active and has an emergency route configured. |
 | Denotes the inbound route is active but there is no emergency route configured. |
 | Denotes the inbound route is inactive. |