Can attended call transferring be better?

[Brian A]

Hi 3CX Community,

I have a customer we implemented latest version of 3CX with Yealink T46s phones. Everything is working great however we are running into some operational issues with trying to transfer calls. I am hoping someone here has a solution for this or a work around.

Steps happening: When a call is active and we do attended transfer

1. Select Transfer
2. Select contact (from main screen or directory)
3. Ask contact if they want the call
4. If yes, they hit Transfer and the call is connected.

That works fine, but here is where this breaks:

If the contact says they DON'T want the call:

1. We ask if they want to go to that persons voicemail.
2. If yes, we have to hit *4EXT

The issue with this is we don't know everyone's extension, and I can't find a way for them to look up the contact and then send directly to voicemail. They would have to click directory, click remote book, look up contact, note extension, then hit back, then hit *4EXT.

One fix is print out a list of physical extensions so they can do this, but I was hoping there was a way they could do this through the phone and not print out a physical list.

Thanks everyone for the help

 

[leejor]

Sure, use blind transfer and make them take the call, or they can let it ring and eventually go to voicemail

I'm not aware of an option that gets around dialling the code+extension to send the caller direct to the destinations voicemail. Someone else may have a work-around used elsewhere. You could post a feature request in the Ideas forum, where it would send automatically to the VM of the party you had began a transfer to. It sounds like something that others may make use of.

 

[DSXVOICE]

To go straight to VM, you prepend the extension with *4 - it works in V15.

 

[jbryant84]

Smaller offices don't take very long to remember extension numbers. It may be worth putting the extension number in the extension name, so it will show up on BLFs and contact list.

 

[lneblett]

Unfortunately, the only way to do as you desire is to add expansion modules to the T46 and then set the keys to do whatever you please. Otherwise, the lookup is the only way be it the 3CX remote or local contact is it. I assume that there are just a few extensions that handle the majority of transfers and perhaps the added expense of the EXP40 is worth it in these few cases. Not knowing how many extensions there are makes it a little problematic to know the scope of the issue.

Personally, I am in the blind transfer camp. It has never really made much sense to me to have a middleman extension who still has to call the extension to negotiate if the destination extension is willing to take the call. To me, the destination extension can choose to either accept or reply by pressing the keys on the phone and as they can see the name and number calling, its their option rather than having to use the middleman to spend time handling and then possibly having to explain why the callee could not take the call (but could take the middleman's call). My real pet peeve is when I call and the person answering is not the one I need, but that person then asks something along the lines of "may I ask what this is in reference to?". Nevertheless, I understand that clients want this, as well as not allowing blind transfers.