Genesys Cloud - Main

We turned on listen for extension dialing on our mail menu and changed our announcement to be something similar to " Thank you for calling, if you know your party's extension you may enter it at any time. Press 1 for Customer Support, Press 2 for …."

 

When testing we found there is not an "out of the box" handling of call if the caller entered an invalid extension number. We are still in pre-production mode and when we asked our engineer how to address, they came up with a prompt to tell the customer to enter an extension. If an extension is entered, it will validate it. If good, the call is routed, if bad, the caller is prompted to try again.  If nothing is entered, the prompt times out (6 seconds) and then the caller is taken to the main menu that has the other prompts, Press 1 for this, Press 2 for that, Press 3…….

I don't really like this solution that well and I'm really surprised that Genesys does not have an "out of the box" solution for this.

 

How are other companies addressing an incorrect extension entry when dialing by extension?

Thanks

#ArchitectureandDesign

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Ben Marthin
Vehicle Service Group, LLC
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Hi, Ben,

As far as I know, most people who want extension validation either:

1. Dedicate one or two digits on the main IVR to extension dialing, and have all company extensions start with one of those digits. So, option 1 might be transfer to Sales, 2 and 3 would be extension dialing actions, 4 transfer to a sub-menu for customer service, 5 transfer to support, etc. That way if someone dials an invalid extension that begins with 2 or 3 they will hear the invalid extension prompt. If they dial something that starts with one of the other main menu options it will go to that option, since you do not have Listen for Extension Dialing turned on for the menu. This method, obviously, takes up two of the IVR positions but it gives you the feedback for an invalid extension.

2. Other folks designate one number on the main menu to access a sub-menu which has 1-9 set up as Dial by Extension actions. The main menu says, "To dial an extension, press one" and at the next menu "Please dial your party's extension". That will give feedback for an invalid extension no matter what number they start with (except zero). The down-side to this option is having to press an option first before dialing the extension.

So, those are the two main methods people use if they want invalid extension feedback.

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George Ganahl CCXP, GCP
Principal Technology Consultant
Genesys
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Also...judging by your description, it sounds like the solution given to you is using a Starting Task with a Dial by Extension action as the first thing (which has a default inter-digit delay of 6 seconds, but you can drop that down if you want) followed by the rest of your main menu, though I'm just guessing.

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George Ganahl CCXP, GCP
Principal Technology Consultant
Genesys
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-10-2019 16:40
From: George Ganahl
Subject: Dial By Extension

Hi, Ben,

As far as I know, most people who want extension validation either:

1. Dedicate one or two digits on the main IVR to extension dialing, and have all company extensions start with one of those digits. So, option 1 might be transfer to Sales, 2 and 3 would be extension dialing actions, 4 transfer to a sub-menu for customer service, 5 transfer to support, etc. That way if someone dials an invalid extension that begins with 2 or 3 they will hear the invalid extension prompt. If they dial something that starts with one of the other main menu options it will go to that option, since you do not have Listen for Extension Dialing turned on for the menu. This method, obviously, takes up two of the IVR positions but it gives you the feedback for an invalid extension.

2. Other folks designate one number on the main menu to access a sub-menu which has 1-9 set up as Dial by Extension actions. The main menu says, "To dial an extension, press one" and at the next menu "Please dial your party's extension". That will give feedback for an invalid extension no matter what number they start with (except zero). The down-side to this option is having to press an option first before dialing the extension.

So, those are the two main methods people use if they want invalid extension feedback.

------------------------------
George Ganahl CCXP, GCP
Principal Technology Consultant
Genesys
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