Auto Attendant Help for this thick-headed bleep! 2

[kgoods]

Hi again guys,
I've been asked to set up an AA for one ext. (the big boss).

I've messed around with it for almost two days now and still can't it set up the way it needs to be.

I don't think I'd have a problem setting this up for the entire company as I've seen quite a few posts here that spell it out pretty well (as does the Avaya MM docs).

My problem is that this needs to be done with just the one extension.

This is the way he wants it to work. If he is gone or on his phone he wants the AA to pick up and allow the caller to press 1 for his voicemail or 2 to transfer to his assistant. I saw a post earlier this year that showed how to do this with Merlin Mail but we have Merlin Messaging (v4) and I couldn't make it work. Also he wants both him and his assistant to be able to keep thier current VM boxes. I don't know if this complicates things further or not but, his assistant is also the operator station.

I tried setting up an adjunct with a auto attendant VM box and putting it as a member in a Integrated VM group, then another group with just him as a member overflowing to that group, but that did not work. I've also tried several other things but nothing seems to work except removing his VM box and recreating it as an AA. But then he doesn't have his original VM box any more. (I've actually been doing all this with an unused ext to test. )

I've told him all he really needs to do is to record a new VM message stating, "I'm on my phone or away from my desk, dial zero for my assistant or stay on the line to leave a message." But that evidently sounded too easy.

Any help would be appreciated much.

Kind regards,
Ken

 

[Telecomboy]

It's probably never going to work exactly how he wants it with the Merlin Messaging. In order for his calls to go to AA, you need to delete his mailbox and recreate it as an auto-attendant extension (for AA2). Then, create your AA2 menu, (1) for him, (2) for reception. The issue becomes that he will now have to have another extension for his voicemail box. So, you'd create a phantom with voicemail that you steer press 1 to. Then, he'd have to check that extension for voicemail vs. his extension which would now be an auto-attendant. Maybe someone else on the forum has a better way to do this, but that's my thought.

Your way of pressing 0 or staying on the line was how the Messaging was designed and is the smoothest way to do it.

The IP Office with VMPro could accomplish this task easily and exactly the way he describes.

 

[kgoods]

Thanks Telecomboy,

Nice to know I wasn't being as thick-headed as I thought. Believe me I tried everything I could think of using calling groups and group coverage and I just couldn't get it to work.

I guess I should have asked here first but being thick-headed and all.... Oh well, I learned a little bit more about the system so it wasn't a complete waste of time.

Thanks again,
Take care,
Ken

 

[TouchToneTommy]

How about this:

Delete his current mailbox.

Recreate it, but instead of pressing 1 to create a mailbox, press 3 to assign it to an auto attendant. Choose one that is not being used, lets say 4. Press 9 to assign it as "with a phone"

Go to AA-4. Set the Schedule to follow Business Schedule, closed all days. Set the selector codes in the Night Menu, 1 as mailbox transfer to 9994, 2 as transfer to Ext. XXX (his assistant). Disable selector codes 3 through 9. Set the Dial-0/Timeout to also transfer to his assistant, OR, record a message in the General Mailbox, whichever he prefers (he won't tell the callers of that option, but you can't disable it, so be prepared to deal with it.) Finally, make him the Owner of AA-4's General Mailbox. Consider what should happen if someone 0's out of mailbox 9994, set the Personal Operator to that setting. Record and Activate a Personal Greeting in mailbox 9994.

So, call is transferred to his phone, he doesn't answer, AA-4 answers. Press 1, mailbox 9994 comes on, plays his personal greeting, takes the message, turns on his light. If the caller presses 2, it transfers to his assistant.

You can't do it for everyone, but he IS the Big Boss, after all.....

 

[kgoods]

TTT,
Thanks for another way to do this. I had thought about doing it this way and nearly had it set up. I didn't think about using the Business Schedule and night service though and didn't know I could make him the owner of one of the built in mailboxes. I set up an auto attendant on another extension instead of using 9994 and tried using groups and overflows to make it happen so, of course, it didn't work.

Three questions...
How do you make an extension the owner of another mailbox?

When he checks his VM he is used to dialing the VM (7929) then just pressing # to enter his extension, then password and # again to get in. Wouldn't the initial # take him to the AA associated with his personal ext? Meaning he would would have to dial 7929, 9994 #, password #, this in itself would probably be unacceptable.

We only have a 4 port VM. If the first three are being used wouldn't the next call transferred to VM go to 9994 and the caller would then be presented with the greeting recorded for that mailbox? If so, that greeting would have to be pretty generic so as not to confuse callers that are calling someone other than the boss.

Just trying to make sure there are no gotchas before I try it.

Thanks again for your input!

Take care,
Ken

 

[TouchToneTommy]

You make him the "owner" of the mailbox under system parameters, option 1. You specify auto attendant number 4, and his extension as the owner of the general mailbox. This just means that when a message is left in 9994, his message light comes on.

Yes, he will have to dial 7929 to reach voice mail, then 9994#-password# to access his new mailbox. If that's too much for him, then it's time to get out NOW!!

The ports on the voice mail are not associated with the mailbox or auto attendant that answers. Rather the mode codes that the Magix sends at the beginning of the call tell the voicemail system what to do with it. So a call covering to voice mail from his extension is directed to the mailbox matching his extension number. But when you created his mailbox, you steered it to auto attendant number 4, so that's what answers.


I suggest using the business schedule, and night always, so the Night Service button does not change his message. BUT, you could also use the schedule to change it during business hours.

 

[kgoods]

Awesome info as always Tommy,

Quite a few things make more sense now.

I'll run this by him and see if he will not mind pressing 4 more keys to get to his VM. If not, I'll give it a go.

Thanks much!

 

[cvrbob]

What size phone does he have
?
any blank button's ?

program auto dial for VMCG 7928
program auto dial for 9994#

 

[kgoods]

cvrbob,

Great idea... why didn't I think of that?

Oh... 4412D+, lots of available buttons.

Thanks!