[scott]

A basic solution for me was to merge several songs together into a single MP3. This gives the illusion of a full sound track. Then I created several variations on this theme and am running a script to swap out the file when we auto-reboot the server, which occurs every Saturday night.

Scott...

[SY]

A basic solution for me was to merge several songs together into a single MP3. This gives the illusion of a full sound track. Then I created several variations on this theme and am running a script to swap out the file when we auto-reboot the server, which occurs every Saturday night.

Scott...

Changing of "MOH file" doesn't require "auto-reboot"...

[1tb]

As it stands (as we understand), 3CX currently can only:
- Support 1 single sound file for MoH
- Always starts that sound file over every time any user is placed on hold.

Our current in-house Asterisk does the following:
- Allows any number of sound files that can optionally be played at random. Therefore we can have several songs and/or advertisements that can be played at random.
- The 1st time a caller is placed on hold, they hear the beginning of the randomly picked file and each subsequent time the caller is placed on hold, the hold music they hear picks up right where it left off as if the song were playing the whole time. So, if I put a caller on hold 10 times during a call, they never hear the beginning of the song/advertisement more than once, unless they are on hold long enough for the song to end for the next song to begin.

Apparently MoH is not a high priority for 3CX development at the moment... However, the age and popularity of this thread (and many other threads discussing MoH) would suggest that many 3CX customers were hoping for at least a marginal improvement in MoH over what we have at the moment.

Granted that there are many other important features in the V9 roadmap, but after seeing the absolute flexibility and power of your Asterix MoH, I am envious and dissapointed that I will have to tell my customers that their 3CX upgrade insurance still doesn't give them back the functionality they gave up with their old digital PBX (eg - music streamed from an external source - and they are still moaning about it!). I'll just tell them not yet, maybe later...

MoH may be unimportant for a call centre, but for many businesses it is a perfect opportunity to keep clients informed of latest news/deals - and can impact very positively on a caller particularly if done in an intelligent manner. Unfortunately, MoH done badly can be a real turn-off that impacts quite negatively on the caller.

IMO - The MoH system and the default track that ships with 3CX impact quite negatively on me and on my customers - it is literally a blemish on what is otherwise a very fine piece of software.

A bit of spit and polish on the 3CX MoH system would go a long way!

[KerryG]

Yes, the default music isn't fantastic, I have been searching for something even more annoying. Something absolutely horrible to listen to, I mean something that just annoys the **** out of you while listening to it as the only people I put on hold are telemarketers.

On the other hand, if you want some better music, go to http://opsound.org and you can download a bunch of stuff all licensed under the creative commons license which allows you to do basically anything you want with the files. It may take you a while to sort through it and find some stuff you like, but there is TONS to choose from.

[instantexpert]

My biggest frustration with this whole feature is that the development team could *dramatically* improve things for many customers by the simple action of routing an external input through the existing code.

Leon

[1tb]

Yes, the default music isn't fantastic, I have been searching for something even more annoying. Something absolutely horrible to listen to, I mean something that just annoys the **** out of you while listening to it as the only people I put on hold are telemarketers.

Kerry you act like you never put anyone on hold (or apparently never need to), but consider that many clients make use of the excellent feature in 3CX of 'Incoming Call Queues' because they have limited staff to attend to many incoming calls. So I'm just curious as to what you think is appropriate in this situation. Do you simply play silence to those in the queue with just the announcements about their position?

Agreed that the V9 Roadmap features stated by Leonidas such as: Ring Back / Longest Waiting Queue Strategies / Real Time Call Stats / Wrap up time / Logging in and out of Individual Queues / Publishing Real Time Stats to a Website / Advanced reports.- Assistant Conferencing / Status From Assistant... are definitely worth a few hundred bucks a year...

Yes, but probably only if your client is a Call Center.

I would have thought that an incremental improvement in MOH would appeal to a broader section of the 3CX userbase (certainly the majority of my existing 3CX clients)- are these what you would call 'Hard Core' clients? - Perhaps the 3CX development strategy at the moment is to capture more of the call centre market, rather attending to minor improvements which benefit ALL existing clients.

If the previous posts provide a true indication, it would seem that quite a few resellers are having difficulty justifying the 'upgrade insurance' to their valued clients year after year- admittedly over a small thing like MOH. Initially what is happening here is far from 'yanking out the system' - they are just 'yanking out the upgrade insurance'. Some clients are savvy enough to notice this themselves, and they often seek out comparisons to other PBX vendors- which as resellers and consultants, we will either have to defend or embrace in the future.

btw- thanks for the link to opsound (found some good tracks over there!)

I note that some participants in this thread have devised workarounds to improve MOH using scripts to swap out the moh file. I've created another thread for discussion of these tips/workarounds over here: http://www.3cx.com/forums/music-on-hold-workarounds-and-tips-v8-x-13580.html

[KerryG]

My personal call volume to my home office is VERY low, so if I am putting someone on hold its only for a few seconds or its because I dont want to talk to them. Our main office system is different, we often do have people sitting in the queue for a while and need more pleasing music for them.

[entelit]

Maybe I am missing something here, but if the plans for version 9 are to make the software more friendly to call centers with advanced reporting etc. Why is music on hold not a priority?? Call centers often experience cue hold times in excess of 10 mins at times depending on the client. They also have callers coming in and out of hold numerous times during a call. A tech support cue for example, the technician may place the caller on hold 3 or 4 times during the call to investigate/research inquiries. The ability to have the music on hold features explained previously are a major requirement for this type of scenario. I am not sure why having the same file start over and over again from the beginning is something that the 3CX development team is ok with!!!! Especially considering it is a MAJOR sell point for many clients as already discussed. I shutter at the fact that this could be implemented in a major production call center environment and have very minimal control over what clients hear while waiting. Waiting on hold is a major opportunity to showcase additional products and services, and also a place where clients can be won or lost. They need to stay interested in what is playing, and they need to STAY on the line long enough for someone to address their call. I know that as a customer myself, if I had to hear the same old tune played over and over again from the beginning when coming in and out of hold it would make me absolutely furious, enough so that I would probably re-evaluate why I was calling and waiting on hold in the first place. 3CX you really, really need to re-evaluate your business stance on this feature as it is no doubt causing many potential customers to look elsewhere for a more client/end user focused PBX. From what I can tell so far, this is the only thing besides the advanced call center features that is really missing from what is otherwise an amazing piece of software for Windows!

[LeonidasG]

Version 9 will give you the ability to use 5 different music on hold files.

You can either set the music on hold to change randomly for each call.
Or
To rotate once per day


Happy? :>

[entelit]

You can either set the music on hold to change randomly for each call.
Or
To rotate once per day

So each new caller will start at a new track when they call, but what happens when the first tune ends, will it play over and over again, or continue to rotate through the tracks?

I'd say any change to the music on hold system is very welcome, this way frequent callers who may only be on hold for a min or so in the system will have something different to listen too each time. It makes the system look way more professional when the music can rotate. Just my two cents.