Outbound rules - calls with minimum length

[Edward Paine]

Can someone explain how I set any calls at or over a certain length (11 in our case) to go to our single SIP provider? The text says "Calls to Numbers with a length of" which implies it has to be exact. We dial several international numbers with varied lengths.

Could I put 11-15?

Or can I just leave the/all boxes blank (if 3CX is clever enough to realise when an extension is being dialled)?

 

[Saqqara]

Not sure if you can specify 11-15 in the length of call, can always try it.

If it does not work, create separate rules for the different lengths of numbers

If you need to route all international calls down this one line, use the prefix option (enter your international dialling code i.e. for UK it would be 00)

Info on outbound rules - https://www.3cx.com/docs/manual/sip-trunks/ - just remember 3CX processes the rules from the top down.

 

[leejor]

Or can I just leave the/all boxes blank (if 3CX is clever enough to realise when an extension is being dialled)?

You can't just leave all boxes blank.

When a number is dialled, it is compared against extension numbers and SIP IDs before "proceeding ' to the outbound rules.

 

[giwm]

Depending on what your SIP provider expects, you may find multiple rules helpful. I have the following 'calls to numbers with length of':

7 digits - prepends the area code and sets route (a couple of these, depending on the Extension group so I append the correct area code)
10 digits - prepends a 1 and sets route
11 digits - sets route

Realistically I probably don't need the 10 digit to prepend, just to set a route.

 

[giwm]

I just re-read your original post and realized my response wasn't quite what you were looking for. But... maybe it'll be helpful to get where you're going so I'll leave it.

 

[leejor]

Here is a link to some better examples, including International numbers that have varying lengths. .

https://www.3cx.com/blog/voip-howto/outbound-rules-a-complete-example/

 

[Edward Paine]

Thank you all for your help. Here are some little discoveries:

• If you enter something like 11-13 in the number length field and click OK it is converted to 11,12,13 (which is fine and does what I wanted).
• If you enter 6,7 in the prefix box it is converted to 6-7. Maybe they had a different programmer doing the logic of each entry!
• I can enter something like 6* in the prefix box - but as far as I can tell it doesn't act as a wildcard.
• I can enter a * in the length box (no idea if it does anything) whereas ">" is picked up as an invalid input.

I must say (again) that 3CX needs better documentation - this is so basic yet not clearly explained.

I have yet to find a clear explanation of the Settings > E164 processing and how it interacts with Outbound rules, so will do more trial and error.

 

[leejor]

There are a number of posts dealing with e164 (Do a Google search for "3CX e164")
Do you use + as a prefix when dialling, or are numbers stored in a directory with + as a prefix? If not, then you don't need to worry about it.

E164 settings simply tell 3CX to change + into a format, that can be used by the outbound rules. Because different countries used different prefixes for national and international dialling, you have to be able to customize it for your area.

As an example...If I'm in North America and I dial (or a number in my directory is stored as) +17145551234, how does 3CX route that call? 3CX needs to know that, in this case, the 1 is a country code, and the + can be removed. Depending on your provider, the 1 may be left on as a long distance prefix, or removed, as required.

 

[NickD_3CX]

I must say (again) that 3CX needs better documentation - this is so basic yet not clearly explained.

https://www.3cx.com/3cxacademy/videos/advanced/configuring-outbound-routing/

 

[Edward Paine]

NickD - I had indeed sat through that 20 minute video and it doesn't address my question, nor mention anything about the interaction between Outbound rules and the the E164 processing settings. Videos have their place, but when they are read from a script; their screenshots are barely legible; and the content itself could be summarised using (searchable) text, then you have to question their efficiency.

 

[leejor]

Did you look at the definition of E164? It is simply an agreed upon standard (format), for telephone numbers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.164

 

[Edward Paine]

leejor - thanks for your replies. I know what E164 is (as a standard) and have edited my post to show that is was the 3CX E164 processing settings I was asking about. As an example of how the documentation could be improved, a click on the Help button on the E164 settings page could explain that in most cases (certainly in the UK) a 0 prefix needs adding (it's not there on a default installation).

By the way, I imagine that most installations have to deal with a +, if only because so many people have it in their Caller ID so it will (I assume) get picked up if a user dials that Caller ID.