Monitor after-hours mailbox - auto-call engineers to notify of new voicemail

[Block5]

HI there.
I need a way to monitor a voicemail box on 3CX and then have the phone system automatically call a preconfigured list of numbers/extensions.
I currently use VM Notify https://www.freepbx.org/vm-notify and it works great.

My usage scenario:
Customer leaves a voicemail in emergency support mailbox. vmnotify sees the new VM and calls all the ext/numbers in a preconfigured list, over and over.
I need this to be phone calls so it can wake up an on-call engineer in the night.
does anyone know how to achieve this in 3CX?

 

[Evolute IT]

Maybe the CFD can help for that. Use it has a Voicemail and processor (so bypass the extension's voicemail to be able to monitor).

 

[edossantos]

Customer leaves a voicemail in emergency support mailbox. vmnotify sees the new VM and calls all the ext/numbers in a preconfigured list, over and over.
I need this to be phone calls so it can wake up an on-call engineer in the night.
does anyone know how to achieve this in 3CX?

You can use a CFD dialer for this. The dialer needs to check the voicemail folder, where the voicemail WAV files are located, for example:
C:\ProgramData\3CX\Instance1\Data\Ivr\Voicemail\Extensions\ExtNumber

You will need to use a C# script for that, and use the System.IO classes to check if there are new files there.

Once you detect the new WAV file, you make a call to the configured phone number. And you can connect it internally to a CFD callflow, which can play back the voicemail WAV file to the support agent.

Please check this to get started:
https://www.3cx.com/docs/cfd-creating-outbound-dialer/

 

[VoIPTools]

Ernesto always has great ideas. Perhaps I can offer some thoughts too. For those who want to dive in and start writing C# code, take a stab and building a CFD solution.

For those who want to get as much functionality as they can without writing code or paying for an external service, there are a few options. Let's first agree that an email is insufficient to wake someone up in the middle of the night, and sending emails to a distribution group is not any better.

You could, however, use the old approach of forwarding calls to a cell phone rather than a voicemail box. I know that's a hassle -- either you have to update the forwarding number daily, or you have to pass along the support cell phone to the next agent scheduled to be on call (yuck), but it is an option.

You could also forward calls to a queue rather than a voicemail box. The trick is that you must have someone logged into the queue BEFORE the call is forwarded to the queue. How about you create some dummy extensions that are always logged into the after-hours queue, and these extensions forward all their calls to external phone numbers. You can use whatever polling strategy you choose. You just need to make sure the polling interval is shorter than the number of rings permitted by the cell phone before it forwards to the cell phone's voicemail.

If none of these approaches work for you, then you could consider taking a look at the VoIPTools On Call Manager add-on for 3CX. It supports calendar-based recurring schedules. You set up the schedule once and you are pretty much done. I typically suggest setting up the queue approach first (if you want live answer), and then if nobody answers the queue, fail-over to a voicemail box. The tool can monitor the voicemail box and start notifying people by phone, email, and SMS. You control how many attempts before it escalates up to the next level, up to 30 levels, with multiple people per level. And everything is logged so you can track SLA adherence and employee performance.

Any other ideas?

 

[Block5]

nice. I like the voiptools option the best because it's built and done. Thanks to everyone for their great ideas!