When will 3CX Allow Multiple Lines to a Phone?

[Dylan2525]

**I know this may not be the right board for this but I posted to the most appropriate based on what ever 3cx would allow me to post on**

Why doesn't 3CX allow multiple lines to be added to phones? This would solve quite a few complex call flow needs and simplify user management for quite a few companies. My company has 3 Locations and 5 different d/b/'s each with their own DIDs. I regularly need to call out from different ones at the same desk. If multiple extensions could be loaded into a phone (most phones have at least 5 or as many as 20), this would eliminate complex *code routing for outbound calls to pick up the correct CID as well as make it easy for the user to visually know which line they are using outbound and inbound which line is being called.

I'm not a coder/programmer etc but it seems pretty simple if you did this by the following.
1. When you add a phone to an extension, you choose if it is the primary extension or not
1a. if not, then you block all the provisioning features and the primary extension manages the provisioning settings.
2. In the primary extension, when you add the line feature for a BLF options, it gives you an option to select other extension numbers where you have added this phone.
3. The extension that is a second or third extension, etc, can show online or not for that extension/phone based on if the primary extension has added the line or not via the options and confirmed if the phone provisioned or not.

essentially when you add a second line (or more), the additional lines are only managing the additional available SIP lines on the phone and only the primary extension manages the phones additional features and options.

I have already operated a 3cx phones system similar to this except the 3d, 4th, 5th lines were directly programed through the phone UI. While it did work and didn't have many issues (primary one was for updates, you had to do it manually by backing up the phone template and reloading it after update). This was all fine for small systems but you couldn't do this for larger systems because you have to manage the phones by their UI one by one in the actual UI. on a larger scale you it would be nice to see this feature added as the phones already have these capabilities and we are drastically under using there capabilities. Not to mention that being able to do this from the PBX makes this able to be used on large systems.

I am using Fanvil X6Us primarily. About 20 of my 30 phones would ideally have multiple lines on them.

 

[VoIPTools]

I have not tried this in several years, but in the past I was able to manually configure multiple accounts on the phone, and only the auto-provisioned account was managed by 3CX. But I seem to remember hearing that may not be possible anymore?

To your point, the nice thing about having multiple accounts on the phone was that you could share a "group" account on multiple phones and then have access to the shared voicemail box from multiple phones. Again, last time I tried this with Yealink phones, the MWI would turn on if a new voicemail was saved for either account, and when you pressed the voicemail button it would show both voicemail boxes and let you choose which voicemail box to interact with.

Also to your point, you could assign line buttons for each account and by choosing the line associated with the account, you could effectively control your outbound caller ID. All good things.

You should try manually adding a 2nd account to your phone and see if the automated 3CX provisioning process mucks with the manual one. I would like to know if this is still possible. Please share your testing results.

There are other ways to control your outbound caller ID if that is your primary goal. They have been described countless times here in the forums so I won't go into detail again here, but in summary, you can do the following:

• Create outbound rules that require prepended digits. You enter the expected digits + the phone number, and the matching rule strips the extra digits and sends the call out with the DID specified on the rule.
  
  
• Manually change the outbound caller ID specified for your extension. This setting is available in your phone client. But this is a tedious manual process.
  
  
• Use our 3CX Caller ID tool to easily chose the desired outbound caller ID from a list prior to placing the call.

I'm not sure why 3CX does not support auto-provisioning multiple accounts on the same phone, but I am confident if it was straightforward, and did not create other technical issues, they would do it. I suspect this is a technical challenge, not a willingness issue, but that's just my guess.

 

[illcsales]

This can be done we do it all the time though it may not be supported it works. It is a manual configuration on the phone and as long as you match up the BLF provisioning to not disturb the locations on the phone with a blank selection 3CX provision will not affect the manual blf.

 

[SweetAction]

**I know this may not be the right board for this but I posted to the most appropriate based on what ever 3cx would allow me to post on**

Why doesn't 3CX allow multiple lines to be added to phones? This would solve quite a few complex call flow needs and simplify user management for quite a few companies. My company has 3 Locations and 5 different d/b/'s each with their own DIDs. I regularly need to call out from different ones at the same desk. If multiple extensions could be loaded into a phone (most phones have at least 5 or as many as 20), this would eliminate complex *code routing for outbound calls to pick up the correct CID as well as make it easy for the user to visually know which line they are using outbound and inbound which line is being called.

I'm not a coder/programmer etc but it seems pretty simple if you did this by the following.
1. When you add a phone to an extension, you choose if it is the primary extension or not
1a. if not, then you block all the provisioning features and the primary extension manages the provisioning settings.
2. In the primary extension, when you add the line feature for a BLF options, it gives you an option to select other extension numbers where you have added this phone.
3. The extension that is a second or third extension, etc, can show online or not for that extension/phone based on if the primary extension has added the line or not via the options and confirmed if the phone provisioned or not.

essentially when you add a second line (or more), the additional lines are only managing the additional available SIP lines on the phone and only the primary extension manages the phones additional features and options.

I have already operated a 3cx phones system similar to this except the 3d, 4th, 5th lines were directly programed through the phone UI. While it did work and didn't have many issues (primary one was for updates, you had to do it manually by backing up the phone template and reloading it after update). This was all fine for small systems but you couldn't do this for larger systems because you have to manage the phones by their UI one by one in the actual UI. on a larger scale you it would be nice to see this feature added as the phones already have these capabilities and we are drastically under using there capabilities. Not to mention that being able to do this from the PBX makes this able to be used on large systems.

I am using Fanvil X6Us primarily. About 20 of my 30 phones would ideally have multiple lines on them.

This is a great idea and a related forum idea is here: https://www.3cx.com/community/threads/multiple-accounts-on-one-phone.68403/
But I like how you detailed out how it would work as I think it's very clean.

I will point out that at scale, you can do this, although unsupported. You can use a custom template that pulls variables from the database so with a bit of modifications to both the template and the DB, you can almost build this as described today. It would be a pain and many hours, but doable. Or hardcode in creds to a template and skip the DB mods, but long term that causes more work.

You should try manually adding a 2nd account to your phone and see if the automated 3CX provisioning process mucks with the manual one. I would like to know if this is still possible. Please share your testing results.

At least in v14 days, adding it manually in the Phone UI would be wiped on reprovisioned. That's the last time I tried it and then went the custom template route for my need at the time.

 

[illcsales]

I can confirm in v18 we have two systems homed to one desktop phone the only thing is once in a while the manually configured BLF goes offline. Simply clicking the BLF reconnects and turns it back to green. We have not had it wipe in a long time like it used to in earlier versions.

 

[leejor]

I suspect that because of the support nightmare that is foreseen, adding additional extensions to a set, is left up to each administrator, with the understanding that it is not "officially" supported. I have manually added extensions to a set from multiple 3CX PBXs but with the understanding, that I'm on my own if things don't work as expected,

While the basics of simply adding an additional extension (do you limit to one, or many, per set?), may be straightforward, it is the Pandora's box, that that opens up, when it comes to more complex functions operating properly, that has probably prevented it's implementation so far.

 

[illcsales]

I agree it's not the most elegant solution but does work. In our scenarios it is but one line which is used to monitor calls on a different PBX, so we one provisioned conventionally and one manually on each desk phone. There is also the added benefit of selecting to dial out on the manual line with all of its routing and caller id intact. We have also used it where a client has a personal pbx and business pbx this way one desk phone covers both. As @leejor points out it is not supported so your results may vary and 3CX could make changes at any time that may affect its success...

 

[Dylan2525]

At least in v14 days, adding it manually in the Phone UI would be wiped on reprovisioned. That's the last time I tried it and then went the custom template route for my need at the time.

I have this working on V18 on a small instance and still does the same thing. I have it set to manual updates only. I download the config file from the phone, update, and then restore config only. (Fanvil X6U) Its fine with 20 Phones but not 300 over multiple locations.

This is a great idea and a related forum idea is here: https://www.3cx.com/community/threads/multiple-accounts-on-one-phone.68403/
But I like how you detailed out how it would work as I think it's very clean.

Unfortunately, I am too "new" i believe to post there as I would have added this to the ideas part.

I will point out that at scale, you can do this, although unsupported. You can use a custom template that pulls variables from the database so with a bit of modifications to both the template and the DB, you can almost build this as described today. It would be a pain and many hours, but doable. Or hardcode in creds to a template and skip the DB mods, but long term that causes more work.

Would this not require 3CX instance programing. While the phone template can be modified yes, to get it to be edited by the Management console, wouldn't that mean modifying the actual program/graphical interface? My only modifying the Template, wouldn't you need to "hard Code" the additional extensions into the template. i.e. having a template for each different phone setup?

While the basics of simply adding an additional extension (do you limit to one, or many, per set?), may be straightforward, it is the Pandora's box, that that opens up, when it comes to more complex functions operating properly, that has probably prevented it's implementation so far.

I agree this could be a pandora's box but there seems to be quite a few people who already need this functionality and it really does make things simpler. I would allowing this with different phone systems into the same phone would be a security nightmare but if its already on the same pbx why not. Additionally, 3CX seems to have close ties to a couple of the phone companies, all those companies sell and advertise multiple SIP lines on a phone.



Overall, I would like to see 3CX add this offering, I think a laid out a logical way to handle it in the pbx. However, I am the business owner, not the "IT" guy. I am the IT guy cause its a small business... I know how to logically think about the system and cause and effects. What I don't know is actual coding.... that's where I get over my head.


I do know how to do this manually by the phone UI BUT we are poised to grow to 10 to 15 locations which means around 300+ phones. Manual modification via the phone UI, just is not manageable.

 

[uptime1]

Completely possible. Definitely requires creating a customized template, and getting very familiar with pcodes and 3CX variables. We've done this for years with Grandstream phones, our favorite. Pro tip: First step: Double verify all those additional BLF buttons are really capable of behaving as an account/extension/phone line because on some phones they are not.

 

[SweetAction]

Unfortunately, I am too "new" i believe to post there as I would have added this to the ideas part.

You can hit the +1 to vote it up. More votes - more likely for 3CX to implement.

Would this not require 3CX instance programing. While the phone template can be modified yes, to get it to be edited by the Management console, wouldn't that mean modifying the actual program/graphical interface? My only modifying the Template, wouldn't you need to "hard Code" the additional extensions into the template. i.e. having a template for each different phone setup?

You could hard code it, but you can also reference items in the 3CX DB in your template. And so a fancy interface won't be available, you could have a template that dynamically grabs additional data to add in when requested.

For example:

Obviously 3CX grabs the EXT number of the device requesting this template and updates the file sent to the device on the fly - otherwise the label shown won't be useful.

I agree this could be a pandora's box but there seems to be quite a few people who already need this functionality and it really does make things simpler. I would allowing this with different phone systems into the same phone would be a security nightmare but if its already on the same pbx why not. Additionally, 3CX seems to have close ties to a couple of the phone companies, all those companies sell and advertise multiple SIP lines on a phone.



Overall, I would like to see 3CX add this offering, I think a laid out a logical way to handle it in the pbx. However, I am the business owner, not the "IT" guy. I am the IT guy cause its a small business... I know how to logically think about the system and cause and effects. What I don't know is actual coding.... that's where I get over my head.

3CX has stated that aside from their vision, the ideas forum is what shapes the product. I agree with you and advise the +1 (and anyone else you know that wants it) to show them it's important. As it stands, 3.5 years in and 4 total votes. That would indicate that only 4 forum members think this is needed and why should they spend effort on that when other ideas have hundreds of requests?

I do know how to do this manually by the phone UI BUT we are poised to grow to 10 to 15 locations which means around 300+ phones. Manual modification via the phone UI, just is not manageable.

All I can recommend right now is a partner/person that understands how to put in place what I outlined above so it's scalable. It's not perfect, but I have 10k+ exts using the above.