v20 no more per-office holiday voice messages

[stijngruwier-leiedal]

after upgrading from v18 to v20 (update 0 build 1458) we noticied multiple holiday schemes can be set per department (which is great), but ont he other hand we are missing the function to link specific voice messages to holidays.

in v18 you could register/pre-record a different office holiday voice message for each holiday. something we only had to do once a year and could then forget about it.

in v20 you can only specify which days are holidays but you cannot not pre-record the individual messages for each holiday.
so now each time a holiday comes up we have to think about it to record the specific message , something that is easily forgotten ...

I hope the v18 handling of office hoidays can be brought back in v20 as it was much better than how it is now.

 

[rayt]

Hmmm, yes I tried it and when the holiday starts, the extensions switch to out of office hours and calls then go to the normal VM destination, instead of the HOL IVR (which doesn't appear to exist anymore). Might take a bit more "playing", or another update, before it works as it should...

OK, I've just noticed that on my NFR system that I have upgraded to v20/U2/Build 711, which is on hosted, the "Call Processing Script" option is now available under "advanced" in Admin Console.
I'm guessing that I can now use the script here: https://www.3cx.com/docs/holiday-script/
I haven't tried it yet but will give it a go a bit later today .

 

[Rick-Arcus-IT]

I tried the script, but haven't got it to work yet. The number is configured on IVR 8002, but the call script should transfer the call to 8000, this is an IVR with an end call.
Office hours have been set on the department.

08-07-2024 10:38:21.114    Call(C:23): == Connected L:23.1[Line:10000<<+318812345678{3779df2da546}] and L:23.3[Ivr:8002{e9fc4932a88a}]
08-07-2024 10:38:20.797    C:23: calling from L:23.1[Line:10000<<+318812345678{3779df2da546}] to Route:ROUTER@{10000}10000{6dc6900af7ad}
08-07-2024 10:38:20.797    C:23 + Call started +
08-07-2024 10:38:20.796    Line limit check: Current # of calls for line Lc:10000(@Flux ArcusLab 1[<sip:[email protected]:0/UDP>]) is 1; limit is 10
08-07-2024 10:38:20.796    [CM503012]: Inbound out-of-office hours rule (unnamed) for 10000 forwards to DN:8002
08-07-2024 10:38:20.796    [Flow] No office hours set, office hours assumed
08-07-2024 10:38:20.796    [Flow] It is holiday today
08-07-2024 10:38:20.796    Timezone offset: 120 min.

 

[rayt]

I tried the script, but haven't got it to work yet. The number is configured on IVR 8002, but the call script should transfer the call to 8000, this is an IVR with an end call.
Office hours have been set on the department.

Yeah, same result here. I think I'm missing something somewhere.

I added the WAV file prompt to the Holiday and gave it the same name as the holiday. But the script doesn't play the prompt and wants to route the call to a DN (ie. another IVR, etc), so what's the point of uploading a prompt into the holiday?

It would be great if someone at 3CX could chip in with some instructions on how to get this working properly. We seem to be going in circles here...

 

[fxbastler]

The problem I have with the script is: trunkTimeBasedroute.reason in line 30 is always OfficeHours, no matter if the script is assigned to all inbound calls on a trunk or the script is assigned to a specific DID for the specific department with the holidays. Therefore, the audio is never played.

 

[JulienM]

OK, I've just noticed that on my NFR system that I have upgraded to v20/U2/Build 711, which is on hosted, the "Call Processing Script" option is now available under "advanced" in Admin Console.

Access to "Call Processing Script" no longer seems possible in version 20.0.2.715 (hosted server).

 

[Rick-Arcus-IT]

Access to "Call Processing Script" no longer seems possible in version 20.0.2.715 (hosted server).

Still possible to access here. Advanced -> Call Processing Script. Running 20.0.2.715, self hosted.

 

[JulienM]

Still possible to access here. Advanced -> Call Processing Script. Running 20.0.2.715, self hosted.

The option is available in "self-hosted" but not in "hosted (by 3cx)".

 

[fxbastler]

Addendum, especially to @NicholasP_3CX (because of the presentation of v20 u2 and the explanation in today's webinar) and to @Nick Galea who announced it here:
pls see here in the 6th paragraph, google translate is your friend.

In my opinion, it cannot work as described on the 3CX website. The explanation is incomplete and the image is not correct. The SIP trunk must be bound to the department (this is missing from the explanation). Then the script is also bound to the department (and not system wide as in the image). Then it works - and only then.

 

[rayt]

The option is available in "self-hosted" but not in "hosted (by 3cx)".

It's there for me on V20 U2 build 715. Hosted by 3cx.

 

[rayt]

Addendum, especially to @NicholasP_3CX (because of the presentation of v20 u2 and the explanation in today's webinar) and to @Nick Galea who announced it here:
pls see here in the 6th paragraph, google translate is your friend.

In my opinion, it cannot work as described on the 3CX website. The explanation is incomplete and the image is not correct. The SIP trunk must be bound to the department (this is missing from the explanation). Then the script is also bound to the department (and not system wide as in the image). Then it works - and only then.

Thanks for the tip @fxbastler.
On first try, it looks to work when I bind the the sip trunk to the dept. .

I'll do some more testing...

 

[MartinaP]

But if I have a trunk and multiple Did associated with different departments, how do I do it?

 

[LinkEdge Support]

But if I have a trunk and multiple Did associated with different departments, how do I do it?

It looks like you will need to have a trunk for every department where you want to implement this workaround since you need to bind it for the script to work. I hope they will get the functionalities back like they were in V18, or provide a solution where the script looks at what number was called and checks the holiday table of the department where the DID was assigned. Most customers don't have a separate trunk per site or department. For single-site setups, I don't see an issue implementing this. However, for customers who have one big trunk per country and many different sites with different holidays, we will need to program them manually or at least change the prompt that is being played. The most convenient solution would be if we could select "play holiday prompt" and the system uses the Office Holidays that we configured.

I tested by using the script and letting the system route calls to the script instead of placing it on the trunk itself. This also works, but the trunk still needs to be attached to that department or it won't work.

 

[jmtelecom]

+1
I miss this too, per holliday a different message so customers know how long and why they are closed. What I also don’t understand is that in 'office holidays' you can set all different prompts??? What is the purpose of that then?

please bring it back!!!

 

[Stuhlberger IT]

inbound routes (now is a real pain in the rear find out what numbers go to which extension, on previous versions everything was on one screen)

I missed that too. Now it's under Reports > System > Inbound Rules.

 

[Gilles (Transacom)]

It looks like you will need to have a trunk for every department where you want to implement this workaround since you need to bind it for the script to work.

Thanks for mentioning this requirement. It is not stated in the blog post (though the requirement seems obvious in hindsight given how v20 works) and I spent a lot of time trying to get the script to work before reading your contribution!

 

[LinkEdge Support]

Thanks for mentioning this requirement. It is not stated in the blog post (though the requirement seems obvious in hindsight given how v20 works) and I spent a lot of time trying to get the script to work before reading your contribution!

With pleasure!

It would make more sense if the trunk could be system-wide, and the script matches the DIDs tied to a department together with the holidays that are configured for the department. This would solve a lot of issues in multi-site, single trunk scenarios. Maybe we can solve this by editing the script itself. I will check this possible solution further when the holidays are over.

 

[Fred 4Care Telecom]

We need the global holiday future back, the holiday script is a real disaster. In V18 it was so easy to configure.

 

[guidoq]

I've always struggled a bit with not having a calendar object that we could insert anywhere and manage different hours,holidays for every situation.
I haven't had much time to test holidays with v20 yet.
What I currently use is variations of this simple CFD app to manage holidays that require more complex configuration, like dealing with multiple days and different holidays for different trunks.
basically works by populating the variable component with "DID,DestinationExt,ConditionToCheck" and then adding the various time conditions in the holiday component
I've stripped it down quickly so I don't know if there's any errors but if it's any use to anybody happy to share it (haven't tested it in v20 yet)

 

[VetDigiSolns]

hmm... I just came across this by accident. I haven't upgraded any of my customers yet to V20, and all of mine are still on V18. I've learned that it's best to not upgrade because of these issues. Since I saw another comment that pre-recorded messages cannot be uploaded ahead of time prior to the holiday... I'll be looking for another PBX for my customers. This is an unacceptable response. We do not have the ability to custom record messages at the moment of each holiday, and then scramble to get them in place. Between Christmas and New year's is impossible, and we do the recordings in house for our customers. We cannot have staff working on custom recordings between Christmas and New years. We do all our custom recordings during the summer, and then we program those holidays in November for Christmas and the entire following year. I'll be looking for another PBX for my customers. They won't accept this, and neither do I.

 

[VetDigiSolns]

We need the global holiday future back, the holiday script is a real disaster. In V18 it was so easy to configure.

yes, absolutely. Otherwise I have to find another PBX.