How do I set up a central phone number? - An example use case
Set up a central phone number in sipgate - example use case for routing to teams and departments.
Many of our customers receive their incoming calls on a central phone number. This is usually exactly the one important number found in the phone book, on the internet, or on business cards—and traditionally this number rings at reception, at the switchboard, or at the front desk.
In all sipgate plans, the central phone number can be easily set up via a group or a channel with time profiles. This keeps you flexible if requirements change—for example over the holidays, during company vacations, or simply during lunch break. The practical thing about sipgate: you do not have to reconfigure your forwarding rules in the routing for every case.
Suppose you have an agency and your central phone number leads directly to reception, but reception is currently unmanned. What should you do so the call does not get lost? Very simple: set up forwarding to a specific voicemail or another participant.
Set up time-based routing for groups
As an admin, you first need to set up a group with various participants, which should receive calls in day-to-day work. In this example, this group is called “Reception”.
Go to group routing and click “Edit routing”. In the next step, select “Add forwarding”. You can now choose between forwarding to a voicemail or another phone number.
sipgate-hilfecenter-zentralerufnummereinanwendungsbeispiel-gruppenroutingbearbeiten.jpg If you have decided to forward to a voicemail, you can now select an announcement. You have the option of creating several custom announcements, in which you can, for example, point out your opening hours and/or company vacations. You can also record these custom announcements directly over your phone.
You have two time profiles available. With the different profiles, you have the option of setting additional options within the routing so that different forwardings apply at certain times. For example, you can time your opening hours and lunch breaks. You can also set up two different voicemails. In the first voicemail, for example, you could activate the answering machine function to take incoming calls. In the second voicemail, you can play a message informing callers about opening hours. You can also choose whether or not callers can leave a message after the announcement.
In our example, calls are forwarded to a voicemail. You also have the option of disabling forwarding to voicemail to avoid an increased volume of messages during your absence. Alternatively, forwarding to another phone can also be set up. To do this, at point 2 you simply need to select a forwarding to “Contact, group or phone number” instead of a forwarding to a “Voicemail”, and incoming calls will be forwarded to an available phone or another phone number.
You can change your settings at any time within a few seconds and adapt them to your day-to-day work.
Automatic forwarding on holidays for groups
You can not only set up certain time profiles for groups, but also automatic forwarding on holidays. The time-based routing already set will be retained and automatically used again after the holiday.
With the holiday profile, you can use practical templates for the holidays in your respective federal state to configure routing in advance. This means incoming calls on these days are forwarded immediately to voicemail with a custom announcement.
As an administrator, you can set up the holiday profile for a group. Proceed as follows: Group ➔ Edit routing ➔ Holidays ➔ Add holiday profile.
Then select your federal state from a drop-down menu. The holidays for your federal state for the coming year will be displayed there and automatically updated. If your group should still be reachable on certain holidays, simply remove the check mark next to the respective day. Click on Continue, to save the settings.
In the next step, you can define an announcement for voicemail forwarding. You have the option of using our pre-made announcement templates or uploading your own announcement. You can also set an announcement that applies to all holidays, or upload individual announcements for specific holidays—for example, to wish everyone a happy New Year.
Save the selected announcement and finish editing. You have now successfully set up a holiday profile for the group. The profile is activated automatically and applies all day, so no further settings are required.
As an admin, you first need to set up a channel with various participants, which should receive calls in day-to-day work. In this example, this channel is called “Reception”.
Go to channel routing. Here you can add the desired forwarding to the routing by drag and drop or by clicking (on the right in the sidebar).
sipgate-hilfecenter-zentralerufnummereinanwendungsbeispiel-channelroutingbearbeiten.jpg If you have decided to forward to a voicemail, you can now select an announcement. You have the option of creating several custom announcements, in which you can, for example, point out your opening hours and/or company vacations. You can upload these custom announcements as an MP3 file or have them generated via text-to-speech. To set opening hours in the routing, drag and drop the time filter into the routing or click it into the routing.
You have two time profiles available. With the different profiles, you have the option of setting additional options within the routing so that different forwardings apply at certain times. For example, you can time your opening hours and lunch breaks. You can also set up two different voicemails. In the first voicemail, for example, you could activate the answering machine function to take incoming calls. In the second voicemail, you can play a message informing callers about opening hours. If you do not want callers to be able to leave a message, select forwarding announcement instead of voicemail.
In our example, calls are forwarded to a voicemail. You also have the option of changing the forwarding from voicemail to call end to avoid an increased volume of messages during your absence. To do this, click on the voicemail and then on Edit forwarding, or replace the voicemail in the routing by placing the Call end function from the sidebar over it. Alternatively, forwarding to another user or channel can also be set up.
You can change your settings at any time within a few seconds and adapt them to your day-to-day work.
Automatic forwarding on holidays for channels
You can not only set up certain time profiles for channels, but also automatic forwarding on holidays. The time-based routing already set will be retained and automatically used again after the holiday.
With the holiday profile, you can use practical templates for the holidays in your respective federal state to configure routing in advance. This means incoming calls on these days are forwarded immediately to voicemail with a custom announcement.
As an administrator, you can set up the holiday profile for a channel. To do this, add the date filter from the sidebar to the routing.
Then select your federal state from a drop-down menu. The holidays for your federal state for the coming year will be displayed there and automatically updated. If your group should still be reachable on certain holidays, simply remove the check mark next to the respective day. Click on Continue, to save the settings.
In the next step, you can define an announcement for voicemail forwarding. You have the option of using our pre-made announcement templates, having an announcement generated, or uploading your own announcement. If you want different announcements for different holidays, deselect the desired holidays when creating the date filter and then add them as another holiday profile.
Save the selected announcement. You have now successfully set up a holiday profile for the channel. The profile is activated automatically and applies all day, so no further settings are required.
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