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Newbie - Stopped Services Notification

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Elent734

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I am a newbie to the power of a gzillion so prepare to smirk....

I literally know nothing about what I am currently doing other than:

1. I need a Windows phone more or less yesterday on my pc only that has voicemail, records messages and can call queue. That's it.
2. Right now I'm a start-up with just me, myself & I - this may change and I may need to employ or I may disappear into the ether like hundreds of start-ups before me; so I need a low risk, low learning curve solution that meets simple immediate needs 'for now'.
3. I bought a number through a Voip Provider that only does numbers.
4. I downloaded the 3cx softphone and signed up with the 3cx 'system' (on the basis that this is how I'll get the features I need).
5. I set up the softphone via the the Voip Number Provider and I now have a softphone image on my pc that takes calls and that's it. No voicemail, no recording, no nothing.
6. The set-up is based on the extension and details given to me by the Number Provider not the extension given to me by 3cx system.
7. The account that is with 3cx pabx system is not in the softphone and I don't know how to put it there without losing the number and minimal functionality I have with the Voip Provider. The number I have is the number I want but working with the 3cx system not just on the phone icon if that makes sense.
8. I then had lots of emails and lots of pain. And wanted to die a little when I realised the suffering I was about to go through to get the little things I need.
9. One of the emails was entitled: Stopped Services Notification and informed me that all the services I had signed up for just earlier that day.... were stopped. Porquoi? I don't know. I can still sign into my account but now see little black labels denoting the stopped services.
10. I sign into my account and the backend tries to get me to assign its own extension to a 'real' phone which I don't possess. There appears to be no recognition of the softphone I've downloaded or my Voip Provider extension.

In a Disney World, the magical start-up fairy would now descend and tell me what I've done wrong, how to put it right and how to easily set up my little features whilst by-passing the six month technical learning that this seems to take.

Now I need some cake.
 
@Elent734

I have cake. Lots of it. You're welcome to some if you like, but I don't give cake away for free.

This is the reason why many of us invest countless years of practice, execution and education for us to be the best in what we do. There is a certification program that we follow to become a basic 3CX Engineer, and then go on to Intermediate, and finally advanced certification. It takes knowledge and an incredible investment of time.

If you have a specific question you need to start with reading the manual and or searching the forums for your answer. If you still need help after that, no problem. Someone can (and usually will) point you in the right direction.

If you are looking for someone to hold your hand and tell you how to do an install for free, good luck. You're asking people to give away their services and time for free. Would you go to work every day if you weren't getting paid for what you've learned how to do? Neither do we.

You have partner choices in your area or close to it. Everyone does. Please check the "Find a partner" link (https://www.3cx.com/ordering/find-reseller/) to help you with a setup or try it and learn through trial and error. It's not that hard to find the answers, you just need to be patient.
 
Thank you Marari: Manual/Forum Search or Partners is your answer.

Nothing I didn't know there but I appreciate your signposts. I will in due course, and no doubt, do all of those.

You are an engineer - yay! And I am the 'whodoIthinkIam' daring to ask questions about technicalities on a ... (how to put this) SELF-HELP FORUM.

I wasn't inviting engineers to answer who charge dollars for their brilliance - up to you if you wanted to answer just to say you weren't going to answer... bit weird but, okay.

Yes, I did invite you to smirk ... but that was more a turn of phrase, wasn't actually expecting anyone to actually do so. You took me a bit literally there...

And by the way, I do often give away my skilll set for free, as do millions of lovely humans. At my age, I've learned it makes a happy and healthy world to do a little of that every so often.

But to clarify - unless dollar-paid engineers want to answer, these aren't the guys my question is directed to. It's directed to newbies who got over the learning curve and now are super-happy to help other newbies as I hope to hell I will be when I've navigated these waters.

And brilliant engineers such as your good self, can quietly crack on, smirk at us newbies, eat their cake and not give even a crumb to the cat.
 
Hello @Elent734

From your description i am not really sure what you tried so far so i will try to provide some general advice to get you started.

To have voicemail, recording and queue capabilities you will need to be a registered extension to a 3CX PBX and not directly to the provider. The provider should also be connected to the PBX so that all traffic and routing is controlled by the PBX.
Not really sure if you created an instance with PBX Express or you installed 3CX to a local machine but here are some links to help you set things up.
https://www.3cx.com/3cxacademy/
https://www.3cx.com/docs/manual/
https://www.3cx.com/phone-system/free-pbx-cloud/

Every system out there has a learning curve and in my opinion 3CX is one of the easiest to learn and self manage but still requires some time to learn. You will also find that there is more than enough documentation online to help you get started. If you are having issues however setting everything up then i would also recommend contacting a partner for assistance.
 
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@YiannisH_3CX

Thank you so much for this. This is all I need to get started - a pointer in the right direction. Reading through the whole manual with not a clue what I'm looking for is like trying to learn Russian and your first teacher gives you Dostoyevsky in its original print. But your second teacher gets you to count to three in the first week and say hello and you actually feel much more confident that you can get to where you need to go with the second teacher.

So now I know what to search for to kick me off. Currently I have no idea what 'created an instance with PBX express' even means - but hopefully by the end of the day I will. (I have the system hosted by PBX currently and will migrate to my own cloud if/when the business warrants it if that answers that question).

I appreciate this is one of the easiest systems to manage but many complex systems have ways to bypass the technical learning curve so that you can just do what you need to do in the short term.

Website building being a case in point. Back in the day you had to be a programmer, now I see six year olds able to set up simple sites with simple front end editors. (And I include myself in this, having set up several pretty nice sites that 'did the job' with limited knowledge). Invention is the mother of necessity and busy (read 'overwhelmed') start ups on a tight budget have to use their actual skill set to achieve stuff not in their skill set within a very short time or their business is toast. It's just the way it is, I can't say it's the best way but it is the way it's been with small business since the stone ages.

And I also get that when I've finally got my head round this annoying telecommunications world that I don't want to become an expert in but haven't got the cash to hire an engineer to do for me, I will 'realise' how easy it all was and wonder what the flip flop I was worrying about!!! :) I know. :)

Anyway, it's a new day, the sun is shining and who knows what even my stressed-out head little head will have achieved by the end of it. All is possible, even a working PBX. Thanks again!
 
Glad i could help. Please let us know if you have any questions about the documentation or if you get stuck somewhere. Generally the basic section of the Academy is a good place to start. I forgot to mention that we have live webinars you can attend and learn the basics. https://www.3cx.com/blog/event-trainings/
 
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@YiannisH_3CX

Update: All up and running!

The key was knowing the right question ('what to do) to start searching for the answers ('how to do it') ' - and your post gave me some starting point language to work with.

Half of the obstacle was the language to be honest, if you are brand new to telephony/voip/telecommunications language, phrases such as number of sims or the difference between proxy server and outbound server will leave you weak so it's as much a language learning course as a pbx/voip learning course. But once you've accepted that, you can push on.

There's still it all to learn of course if and when I need to expand or troubleshoot the system but for now I'm delighted that I have one functioning phone with pbx services, understand the importance of correct configuration, have learned some basic contextual language and can find my way around the management console.

Thanks again!
 
Glad i could assist and that you now have a functioning system. And i agree with you that language is very important when learning something new. Often knowing the right question to ask can help you overcome issues much faster.
 
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