Call Flow Example

Penny Graham is a sales manager at ACME Widgets. She travels frequently and is rarely at her desk. When she happens to be in the office she is normally on the phone. Her phone (extension 1234) is forwarded to her voice mailbox if she does not answer or is on another call. Penny's specific call handling requirements are as follows:

Penny's Requirements

Penny's Call Flow Solution

Here is Penny’s Call Flow:
"Hello. This is Penny Graham. I'm not available right now, your call is important to me.
To speak with John, my secretary, press [1];
To leave me a voice message, press [2], or stay on the line. If you would like to speak with an operator, press [0] at any time.."

Both internal and external callers will hear this recording. However, some of Penny’s colleagues know that they can press 8 (not mentioned in the recording) for additional options:
"Hello. You have reached my personal call list.
To transfer to my pager, press [2] and enter your callback number;
Stay on the line or press [0] to leave me a voice message."

In this example, callers dialing Penny’s extension number are forwarded to NuPoint Unified Messaging if she is on the phone or does not answer. Instead of going directly to her voice mailbox, callers reach Penny’s Call Flow. This gives callers the opportunity to try to speak with someone else (always a good alternative) rather than forcing everyone to either hang up or leave a message.

Penny has complete control over who can reach her and when. She can be accessible to her colleagues at the time and days of her own choosing, and still keep her home and pager numbers private.

Penny recorded a greeting ("Hello. This is Penny Graham. I'm not available right now..."), and a menu ("To speak with John, press [1] ...") in her own voice. She (or the NuPoint Unified Messaging Administrator) programmed each key to transfer to a specific extension, outside telephone number, pager number or voice mailbox. A schedule was also set up so that she would not be disturbed at all hours. To address her occasional requirement that she not be interrupted by phone calls unless they are from her kids, an override was put in that permits only calls from selected numbers (home and school for example) to ring her phone.

The following explanation should help you visualize a caller’s path through a personal call flow. The call flow handles incoming calls directed to Penny's voice mailbox. It includes 12 unique actions in the order in which they are executed.

Call Flow Sequence

When a new call arrives, check the Override setting to see whether it is enabled or not.

If Override is enabled, perform a Supervised Transfer to Secretary (John).

If the Override is disabled, evaluate Penny’s Schedule settings.

During off-hours, send the call to My Voicemail.

During on-hours, play the caller Penny's greeting message (My Greeting):

"Hello. This is Penny Graham. I'm not available right now,
but your call is important to me.”

Then play the Main Menu:

"To speak with John, my secretary, press [1];

To leave me a voice message, press [2], or stay on the line.

If you would like to speak with an operator, press [0] at any time.."

Key [1] does a Supervised transfer to John's extension. John's extension is not call-forwarded busy or no-answer, so Penny’s call flow can control the transfer. On a busy or no-answer at 5678, Call Director hook-flashes to get the caller back and moves the caller either into mailbox 5678 (busy) or 1234 (on a no-answer).

Key [0] transfers to the operator.

Key [2] or remaining on the line moves the caller to Penny’s voice mailbox

Penny’s staff knows to press [8] if they really need to reach her. Key [8] moves the caller to Penny's Personal Call List Menu:

"Hello. You have reached my personal call list

To try and reach me at home after hours, press [1];

To transfer to my pager, press [2] and enter your callback number;

If I’m traveling, and it’s important that you reach me directly, press [5]

Stay on the line or press [0] to leave me a voice message."

Key [1] transfers to Penny's home phone number. NuPoint Unified Messaging automatically performs a hook switch flash to get dial tone, dials 9, pauses one second, the dials the number. The call is supervised for 20 seconds (Penny's home answering machine picks up calls after 25 seconds). If Penny's home phone rings no answer, or is busy, the caller is reconnected and continues in the call flow to hear the menu again (retry count is set to 5). This way the caller can try another option on the same phone call.

Notice the small arrow at the bottom left of the My Voicemail icon, . This is called an alias and it means that the No Answer result of the supervised transfer goes to the same Voicemail action as the Off-hours result of the schedule action. You will normally see many aliases throughout a call flow when more than one action result leads to the same subsequent action.

Key [2] transfers the caller to Penny’s outside pager number. NuPoint Unified Messaging performs a switch hook flash, gets a dial tone, dials 9 (for an outside line), pauses one second, then dials 1-800 and the pager number (789-1234). After the pager number answers, the call box connects the caller directly so that he or she can enter their callback number.

Key [5] transfers the caller to outside telephone numbers, which change as Penny travels.

Key [8] transfers to 8234, a secondary line appearance on Penny’s telephone. Even when her primary extension number 1234 is forwarded to voice mail, her secondary extension will ring. This is how her children can reach her when she doesn't want to be bothered. Key 8 is not mentioned in the recording. To prevent just anyone from pressing 8, set up Caller ID to allow calls from Penny's home . To stop calls to her prime number from ringing her phone, she has to temporarily call forward always to voice mail.

Personal Call Flow Example

Penny's Requirements

Penny's Call Flow Solution