Administration

Voicemail Escalation

Feature Description

Voicemail Escalation initiates a call to a configured internal or external telephone number when a message is left in a voicemail mailbox in order to ensure that voicemail messages are promptly handled.  The call is repeated periodically (every 10 minutes) until messages from the mailbox are retrieved.

Introduction

A company uses a voicemail mailbox that is to be attended by a person who is not present on the premises (or who is moving around).  When a message is left in the mailbox, the attendant wants to receive a call from the voicemail system that would allow him/her to retrieve new messages. Different people can be assigned to the task (to process the voicemail messages) at different times.

From the end user perspective:

  • To configure the telephone number for voicemail escalation, the user/supervisor/administrator invokes the standard Unconditional Call Forward feature (by default *720), enters the mailbox number (extension) and then the telephone number of the attendant
  • When there is at least one new message in the mailbox, the UCX system calls the configured telephone number.
  • If the call is answered, the system first plays a prompt that there are new messages in the mailbox and then transfers the call to voicemail.  The attendant is prompted to enter the password for the mailbox in order to retrieve new messages.
  • If the call is not answered within 30 seconds or If messages are not retrieved, the call is repeated every10 minutes.

Prerequisites

The Voicemail Escalation module requires a UCX system version 3.0 or higher with up-to-date software. Please ensure you have completed a successful software update before installing the module.

Step 1 – Install the Voicemail Escalation Module

UCX Release 7.0 Procedure

  1. Login to UCX Administration.
  2. Navigate to the Accessories / Addon Packages page.
    VMEscAddOnPackages.png
  3. Scroll down to the Voicemail Escalation package.
    VMEscInstallStart.png
  4. Click Install.
    VMEscInstallComplete.png

UCX Release 6.0 Procedure

  1. Login to UCX Administration
  2. Navigate to the System – Updates – Packages page.
  3. Press the Repositories Update button to retrieve updated list of software packages available in online repositories.
  4. Press the Show Filter button, enter the text escalation in the Name field and then change the Status control to All.
  5. Press the Install link of the ucx-vmescalation package to install the module.

Step 2 – Create a Virtual Extension for Mailbox

  1. Login to UCX Administration.
  2. Navigate to the PBX – PBX Configuration – Extensions page.
  3. Select None (virtual exten) as the device type and press the Submit button.
  4. In the User Extension field, enter a number of the extension to be used for the mailbox. Note: this extension number is used by the Voicemail Escalation feature as the caller ID number for notification calls.
  5. In the Display Name field, enter the name of the extension.  Note: this name is used by the Voicemail Escalation feature as the caller ID name for notification calls.
  6. Scroll down to the Voicemail & Directory section and set Status to Enabled.
  7. Enter the desired password for the mailbox in the Voicemail Password field.
  8. Press the Submit button to create the extension.

Step 3 – Add the Mailbox Number to Monitored Mailboxes

  1. Login to UCX Administration.
  2. Navigate to the PBX – Tools – Asterisk CLI page.
  3. Enter the command “database show VMESCALATION” to see the current configuration of monitored mailboxes
  4. Enter the command “database put VMESCALATION mailboxes XXXX” (where XXXX is the mailbox/extension number from the previous step). You can enter multiple mailbox numbers separated by comma (without any spaces!).  For example, to monitor mailboxes 5076 and 5079, you would enter the following command:

    database put VMESCALATION mailboxes 5076,5079

The following example shows mailbox 611 being configured for monitoring:

Step 4 – Configure the Destination Telephone Number for Voicemail Escalation

  1. From any telephone, invoke the Call Forward All Prompting feature code (*720 by default).
  2. When prompted for an extension number, enter the extension number created in the step two (the mailbox number) and press #.
  3. When prompted for the attendant phone number, enter the telephone number that is to be used for voicemail escalation and press #.
USEFUL TIP

To change the configured telephone number, repeat the procedure above.

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