The Broadcore Auto Attendant provides enterprises with a powerful and flexible tool to field inbound calls and deliver them to the intended destination through interactions with the caller. The Broadcore Auto Attendant is an integral part of the Broadcore product offering and does not require an external third-party system.

Description

The Broadcore Auto Attendant is reached by dialing an associated phone number or an extension. Once connected to the Auto Attendant, the caller is played a greeting that provides a menu of options to complete call routing. The enhancement, Revised Call Manager and Attendant Console, combines the functionality of the Attendant Console with the Call Manager and the combination features a modernized presentation as well as improved usability and functionality across all mainstream web browsers.
NOTE: The maximum recording length for Auto Attendant is five minutes.

The menu, which is configured by a group administrator, can provide up to nine options to the caller, including:

• One-Key Dialing - The caller presses a pre-defined key to reach a particular phone number or extension within the group. This option is also used to build multilevel IVR menus as shown in the following example.





• Operator Dialing - The caller presses a pre-defined DTMF key to reach an operator.

Tech note about Operator Dialing: In the menu if you want an operator option, it can go on any number. Zero is very typically, but not required. But one and only one digit choice should select Transfer to Operator. If you don't choose any as Operator then if someone does not make a selection, they will be automatically disconnected. And if you have more than one digit with Operator status, again if the caller makes no selection, they will be automatically disconnected. This is not a desirable result.

• Name Dialing - The caller spells the name of the intended party, using the numerical DTMF keypad. Upon identifying a unique match, the caller is played the name of the called party and is then transferred.
• Extension Dialing - The caller enters the extension of the intended party through the numerical DTMF keypad. Upon collecting the full extension, the caller is played the name of the called party, and is then transferred.
• Immediate Extension Dialing - The group administrator may elect to allow callers to dial an extension from the first-level menu. The First-Level Extension Dialing option allows the administrator to enable or disable immediate extension dialing for a given Auto Attendant. When the feature is enabled, the caller, to the Auto Attendant, can dial the desired extension right away on the first level of the Auto Attendant, without having to first navigate to the second-level of the AA menu.
• Dial by First Name - The group administrator may elect to allow name dialing from a combined FirstName- astName in addition to the current LastName-FirstName list.
• Holiday Schedule - A group administrator may define a holiday schedule that can be associated with an Auto Attendant. More than one holiday schedule maybe created. Each holiday schedule may be a maximum of 20 dates or date ranges.
• Enhanced Business Hour Support - Group administrators can define time schedules for their group. Multiple time schedules can be created. Time schedules consist of 20 date/time ranges for a week. Time schedules can be business hours, call center hours, after business hours, and so on. Time schedules created by the group are visible to groups and users.

Auto Provisioning Users in a Group
The moves, additions, and changes for users in a group are automatically available for the Auto Attendant name dialing and extension dialing functions. Adding Privacy to a user can hide them from the Auto Attendant. See User Features>>Privacy for details.

Multi-Site Support
The Auto Attendant uses the multi-location enterprise capabilities of the Broadcore platform to transparently support geographically distributed groups.

Support for Users without DID
The Auto Attendant supports users with a direct inward dialing (DID) number as well as users without an external public directory number. These users originate calls as usual and the Auto Attendant allows them to receive external calls. Calls made to the Auto Attendant use the routing capabilities described above to terminate calls to the appropriate user. This support provides greater flexibility for a group administrator to create and delete users and in many cases reduces the costs associated with obtaining DID numbers.

Configuration

The group administrator configures the Auto Attendant through the Group web portal.
The following options are provided on the Attendant configuration screen:

• Greeting - The group administrator can select the default Auto Attendant greeting or upload a customized greeting that matches the available options.
• Default menu options - The group administrator can assign keys to the default menu options of the Auto Attendant (operator, name, and extension dialing). The administrator can configure the Auto Attendant to allow:
• Extension dialing on the first level of menu.
• Name dialing with first name entered before last name.

• Customized menu options - The group administrator can create customized menu options by associating keys to specific phone numbers.
• Customized actions - The group administrator can assign specific actions to the keys entered by the user. The available actions are shown in the following table:

Action	Number	Transfer prompt	Runtime
Transfer to operator	Text box, in which any number can be entered.	"Please wait while your call is transferred to the operator."	The call is transferred if the number is valid. Otherwise, the call ends with the message, "Your call cannot be transferred; please try again later, thank you".
Transfer with prompt	Text box, in which any number can be entered.	"Please wait while your call is transferred."	The call is transferred if the number is valid. Otherwise, the call ends with the message, "Your call cannot be transferred; please try again later, thank you".
Transfer without prompt	Text box, in which any number can be entered.	None	The call is transferred if the number is valid. Otherwise, the call ends with the message, "Your call cannot be transferred; please try again later, thank you".
Name dialing	Disabled	None	Name dialing.
Extension dialing	Disabled	None	Extension dialing.
End call	Disabled	"Thank you for calling."	Call is released.
Repeat menu	Disabled	None	Menu greeting is replayed.
--- (Not set)	Disabled	Not applicable	Menu greeting is replayed.

• Business Hours - The administrator can define the business hours for the Auto Attendant and select the business hour pattern that applies to the attendant via the web portal.

Once a business time schedule is created, it can be assigned to specific Auto Attendant, as depicted in the following figure:

• Holiday schedule - The administrator can define holiday schedules via the web portal.

Once holiday schedules are defined, they can be assigned to selected Auto Attendants.

• Broadcore voice portal greeting change - The group administrator can record new greeting menus through the voice portal phone interface. This automatically provisions the newly recorded greeting as the active greeting for the Auto Attendant.

Tech Note: Inside the business hours or after hours menu, if you want to look around and not save changes you can click on the Cancel button. DO NOT click this button twice. Click it once and wait for the previous page to load. It is aligned with the Delete button for the hunt group on the previous page.