Going up or or down

[MooreTel]

curly made this statement in a previous thread..."Lines should roll from top to bottom on inbound where outbound you grab lines from bottom up so it was correct."

That is the way I was taught and did it that way for years. That being said I've found the opposite to be even better.

A client with 3 lines and the 3rd line through a Fax Switch. Client complained that he was having a hard time receiving faxes as the 3rd (Fax) line was being used by other phone calls outbound. So I had to re-think the situation. Lines all cascade in order. If the lines cascade why should we leave the main line available?

I decided to reverse L1 & L3, thus whenever someones needs to make a call from the pool, odds are that the Fax line will be left free more often. I've done that on the last 3 or 4 systems that I've installed and it seems to work flawlessly.

Comments?

 

[curlycord]

Well its how the systems are designed and not so much how we are taught.

I do that for the small fry out there too but that's rare.
Depends on the client as well, most are fine with pressing line 3 if 2 and 1 are both busy.
I have even given the fax its own pool/dest code.

No need to do it for a mid/large size company since they are well off and do not need to cheat.

In fact I do my best to let the client know of the options, ATX or ATA along with the KSU etc but strongly advise to use the Fax along with DSL and/or Alarm modems and keep it off the system when they have a few lines.

It's nice to see it as a graph as well.
i.e. 6 triangles lit up at the top or the reception/telrm set vs 4 on the bottom means more inbound then outbound....when you reverse the lines you cant tell incoming from outgoing.
Helps a busy receptions keep track of inbound calls too when they have line appearances.

So overall I like how it was designed but doing the reverse for a small client once in awhile is fine too.









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[MooreTel]

If the lines didn't cascade I'd see your point, but if they do it makes a difference only in line availability for outbound. The main problem is that if the fax or other SLT take the line pool and other phones are set up to use the pool as well, the user doesn't know until they get no line access. Sometimes due to the system setup they don't have room on their phones for line appearances.

If the main reason to go down from the top is as you stated, just move the line buttons on the receptionist's phone to suit her (F*81).

 

[rlsabin]

If the line that you are most likely to grab outbound is the same line that you are most likely to receive an incoming call on then you have created a situation where call collisions are going to be more common, In an small business without a lot of phone traffic it may not be an issue but as the call volume increases you will start getting the " I was going to make a call but I didn't get any dial tone and then someone saying "hello" " complaints.

Rick

 

[MooreTel]

No collision if there's a fax switch as mentioned on that line.

Scenario: 3 Lines with the fax line as line 1, main line as line 3. Outbound, there will be 2 lines available in the pool if not already in use...3 if the fax line is still available. Inbound there is no collision as line 1 (the fax line) has gone through the fax switch.

If all 3 lines are busy in or out the next inbound caller will get a busy signal from the Telco wherever line 1 is physically located on the phone(s).

It would have been real nice if Nortel had given us an option of laying out the pool line order according to our needs. Example: Line 2, Line 1, Line 3, etc.