[davmel]

A useful feature to have would be options to control the destination of incoming outside callers that present themselves as anonymous.
As an example an anonymous caller could be directed to voicemail or to a specific extension or to a digital receptionist or just terminated. Almost all anonymous callers we receive turn out to be telemarketers or auto-dialers that don't answer back so by forcing them to go through an IVR prompt system or voicemail will weed them out from the legitimate callers so we never have to deal with the callers that just waste our time.

[bluetel2]

Nice idea

[MichaelD]

I would like to add my vote for the ability to set an inbound rule to direct anonymous calls directly to voice mail. In fact, I just asked support about this today and found that there is currently no mechanism within 3CX to do so.

MichaelD

[leejor]

Anonymous, private, blocked, or not available are handled in different ways by phone companies around the world depending on the caller ID system. Generally the number is not available because the call has originated or passed through equipment not capable (non SS7) of including the number/name information OR the caller has deliberately blocked their number. In North America, a Private call (blocked number) will result in a "P" being sent, an out-of-area will result in an "O". However, some telcos allow subscribers to block just their name (shows as Private) but still allow the number to show. So you would have to have something that could cope caller ID variables such as these, and more. Would it be acceptable to just route off any call with no caller ID?

I have found that almost all Telemarketers numbers (here at least) either show as nonsense, 000-000-0000, 123-456-7890, or as a toll free number. They can be blocked, but only if they use the same number the second time.

[MichaelD]

Regardless of the method the telco uses to notify that the callerid info is blocked, the 3CX phone system seems to know this, because it reports the number as anonymous. So it would be nice if we could simply enter "anonymous" in the DID/DDI number mask field when setting up an inbound rule.

MichaelD

[davmel]

In North America, a Private call (blocked number) will result in a "P" being sent, an out-of-area will result in an "O". However, some telcos allow subscribers to block just their name (shows as Private) but still allow the number to show. So you would have to have something that could cope caller ID variables such as these, and more. Would it be acceptable to just route off any call with no caller ID?

In Australia it's very rare for a telemarketer to present caller ID. When no caller ID is presented either from a SIP provider trunk or through an ATA PSTN adapter the SIP "From" header always shows "anonymous" so it could easily be filtered and actioned upon if the function was enabled.
A typical SIP header anonymous caller line looks like:
From:"anonymous"<sip:anonymous@123.1.2.3>

I understand that some regional variations can occur, but if the function is enabled then a list box could be used to enter all the different ID's that are typically used in your region to filter the anonymous callers, i.e. "anonymous", "P", "000-000-0000" etc.

From experience telemarketers never leave their contact details etc if they hear a voicemail message (especially if they are asking for a donation or to trying to push the sale of their product or service as they know they won't be called back) so if they are directed to voicemail you'll never have to deal with those time wasters ever again. Any legitimate customer etc will still leave a voicemail to call you even if they have caller ID blocking enabled on their phone service.

Also, it would be ideal if this feature was enabled on an individual trunk basis etc so if you want anonymous callers to still be received on a particular trunk or DID you still can.

[davmel]

Well it turns out the feature to do what I want actually exists. Doh!

On the forwarding rules tab of each extension in the advanced tab you can select "Based on Caller ID" in the rule type and in the Caller ID/DID field entry just enter "anonymous", then set the action to go to voice mail etc.
I tried this in the past and it didn't work because I didn't place the anonymous call filter at a higher priority than the normal diversion to voice mail after X seconds rule. The anonymous call filter must be moved up higher on the list than all other rules for it to work correctly.

Now I can get back to work without telemarketers bothering me. Yay!

[MichaelD]

Well it turns out the feature to do what I want actually exists. Doh!

On the forwarding rules tab of each extension in the advanced tab you can select "Based on Caller ID" in the rule type and in the Caller ID/DID field entry just enter "anonymous", then set the action to go to voice mail etc.

Hmmm, if it works there, I wonder why it doesn't work when you set up and inbound rule that same way?

[davmel]

Hmmm, if it works there, I wonder why it doesn't work when you set up and inbound rule that same way?

Because the Inbound Rules section applies to the trunks rather than the extensions. Forwarding in 3CX at this stage is really only set up to do any complex forwarding at an extension level rather than directly on the trunks.
At this stage the only trunk based routing you can do is to assign a single destination for each DID (or two if you use the optional outside office hours feature) but nothing as complex as the extension based call processing list which can filter calls.

[katy]

We have our system configured to route calls from within our service area - area code 636 618 314 & 573 to customer service. Rest of the calls go to vmail.

No surveys, no telemarketers it is very nice.