Feature missing? - Calling main numbers of trunks internally / giving them an internal system extension

[wxmuc]

Customer has a trunk with office hours, then the main number for an extension for break time filtering, if both are passed the call is forwarded to the queue.
Both are configured with their announcements and queue music afterwards etc.

Problem is if internal users want to call the queue, they either call it directly or I can tell them to call the break time extension but the office times wont count then.

Is it possible to have the internal users be able to call the trunk like external caller would do, but not using double the available lines calling (one for their outgoing and one for that one coming in)?

There doesnt seem to exist such an system extension for the trunks themselves.

The Origin from this scenario is that if some users going for vacation forward their calls (did numbers) to the queue, these callers wont get any annoucements beside "no agents available" when they are signed out.

 

[leejor]

As far as I'm aware, the only two ways of doing this, and not using your provider, are with loop trunks, out and in (still uses two licenses per call), or with the use of the SIP ID. SIP ID can be assigned oly to an extension at this point, as far as I'm aware. It can be the same as a full PSTN number, which means a dummy extension with a SIP ID of your external number (same format as users would dial), could be forwarded to a queue, or elsewhere.

 

[wxmuc]

exactly, it uses double the 3cx licenses per call and sip provider lines doing the forward loop

If I get it right even triple usage when:
1 - an customer calls an users did
2 - users vacation forward to the main trunk number "external"
3 - that external call to the trunk

so 1 call 3 lines/licenses blocked

Anyway I tried the SIP ID, dummy extension with SIP ID 0 (and this up2date bug: https://www.3cx.com/community/threads/sip-id-not-working-after-upgrade.64559/) works, it calls the extension. No trunk office times but the only use from this would be to annouce the break times which is already done by an extension as mentioned.

If only the trunk itself had that SIP ID configur-/ and callable, that would fit perfect (and without the "known issue" of allowing external SIP calls...)

 

[leejor]

If you had a large enough licence, so that simultaneous calls were not an issue, and it was only that you did not want to use more of your provider trunks, then a loop trunk might work...

1. create SIP trunk with 127.0.0.1:5060
2. create outbound rule(s) for this trunk. They should intercept all required numbers
3. attach existing inbound rules to this trunk

I agree, ideally, allowing the attachment of a SIP ID, to trunks, ring groups, queues, etc., rather than just extensions, would be a good start. Having to accomplish things by forwarding through an extension, can become cumbersome.

 

[wxmuc]

Provider should allow 10 lines, 3cx has 16 so yes the loop trunk would be an okay solution I guess.

I set up the local trunk, the catching outbound rule and defined the incoming rule to behave like the main trunk externally, seems to work using more simultaneous calls but no additional provider lines. Thanks

I discovered something, this 3cx has 4 trunks now
main #1
main #2
localhost
webmeeting

the additional trunk added another extension!? typing 10000 / 10001 (localhost) / 10002 in the dialing field actually shows the trunks name (excluding the webmeeting)

actually calling it fails of course, what else to be expected

Activity log:
[Flow] Target endpoint for 10001 can not be built!
Call(C:xx): from Extn:xx to 10001 doesn't match any outbound rule. No outbound rule could be selected.

What? No outbound rule? Same for the other 2...

But what is this now, there is an extension for the trunk itself but it cannot be called. Is there something to be done or is this a bug?

 

[NickD_3CX]

or is this a bug?

Nope, and lopping trunks can cause many issues if you make even the slightest mistake, that's why we don't recommend it, there's just too much that can go wrong. That's of course aside from the Licensing thing where you are eating away at it, but that is by choice in this case.

To be clear, it has been done by other users, they say it works, but nothing in this setup will ever be troubleshooted by 3CX Support nor will be considered a bug.
This because we never purposely designed (it just happens that it can be done...).

Unfortunately the correct answer is, you can't quite do that, but the best suggestion was that with the SIP IDs.

 

[wxmuc]

Alright, and asigning SIP IDs to something other than normal extensions wont happen right?

 

[NickD_3CX]

Alright, and asigning SIP IDs to something other than normal extensions wont happen right?

Not in the plans for now I'm afraid.