[asterisk-users] 20min waiting time

[Steve Totaro]

Eric "ManxPower" Wieling wrote:
> Steve Totaro wrote:
>   
>> Steve Totaro wrote:
>>     
>>> Eric "ManxPower" Wieling wrote:
>>>   
>>>       
>>>> Steve Totaro wrote:
>>>>   
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>>>> OCOSA ListAcct wrote:
>>>>>     
>>>>>       
>>>>>           
>>>>>> I apologize if this question has already been answered / asked. I was 
>>>>>> searching on Google and nothing I do will work. All that happens is that 
>>>>>> the phones ring for 00:01:15 then voicemail kicks in.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> My goal here is to let the phones ring and ring until someone is not 
>>>>>> busy. I think 20000 secs is long enough.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Here is how the dial plan is setup
>>>>>>
>>>>>> exten=>5,1,StartMusicOnHold
>>>>>> exten=>5,2,Dial(SIP/support&SIP/support2,20000,tr)
>>>>>> exten=>5,3,VoiceMail(455 at mailbox)
>>>>>> exten=>5,4,PlayBack(vm-goodbye)
>>>>>> exten=>5,5,HangUp()
>>>>>> exten=>1222,1,VoiceMailMain(455 at mailbox)
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Any help is appreciated....
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Otis
>>>>>>
>>>>>>   
>>>>>>       
>>>>>>         
>>>>>>             
>>>>> Easiest way to solve your problem is to implement a support queue.
>>>>>     
>>>>>       
>>>>>           
>>>> Queues in Asterisk are horrid little creatures.
>>>>
>>>> Many SIP phones and ITSPs will disconnect the call if the destination 
>>>> rings for a long time.
>>>>
>>>> Put an Answer as your first priority, this should fix your problem.
>>>>
>>>>   
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>> That is an odd statement about queues.  I ran a call center handling 
>>> over 15,000 calls a day using Asterisk and queues.  No real problems.
>>>
>>> Please qualify your completely abstract statement, "Queues in Asterisk 
>>> are horrid little creatures."  Statements like this are completely non 
>>> productive to anyone.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Steve
>>>
>>>   
>>>       
>> Sorry to reply to my own post but for clarification, we had four 
>> queues.  English sales, English support, Spanish sales, Spanish Support. 
>>
>> At peek times, we would have 200-300 agents logged in and 600 or so 
>> callers.  This was usually when our ads were running during Jerry 
>> Springer or Judge Judy.
>>
>> I think his two agent single queue would work just fine.  Add 
>> Queuemetrics which is free (I believe) for five or less agents and then 
>> you can actually get some reporting on how your support role is handled.
>>     
>
> In your situation it seems that queues work well for you.  When you have 
> dedicated agents answering calls full time queues work well.
>
> In non-call shops people forget to log out of the queue, are away from 
> their desk often, and otherwise just screw up many of the assumptions 
> that the Asterisk queue system makes.  This is in addition to the 
> learning curve.
>
> For a low number of calls and/or non-dedicated agents, a little bit of 
> dialplan logic can do everything someone needs with something that is 
> massively more flexible.
>   

So you are basically saying that Asterisk Queues are not really a bad 
thing. 

So your blanket statement, "Queues in Asterisk are horrid little 
creatures." should really read, "*Untrained users of Queues in Asterisk 
are horrid little creatures"

*Well with any system, if users are not trained properly or do not use 
the system correctly, there will be problems.  I would not blame it on 
the software through.

There are steps you can take to mitigate some of the harm done by user 
error.  One is the removal of an agent from the queue if they do not 
answer the call (agentcallback), that is built into Asterisk.  Another 
is a more complicated but works well.  It involves an ActiveX control 
loaded into IE that speaks jabber to your Asterisk box.  The user/agent 
must be actively moving through the CRM or a popup will ask if they are 
still there, they have ten seconds to click yes, or Jabber sends a 
message to Asterisk to remove them from the queue.

Another thought I had but it never went beyond a thought was sort of 
like reverse answering machine detection.  Some sort of logic that 
listens to the agents channel for voice (such as hello or thank you for 
calling) within a relatively short period of time.  If no voice was 
detected, the agent would be logged out and the call routed to another 
agent.  This feature would be great for call centers that use agentlogin 
rather than agentcallback.

Tied with Queuemetrics, you can quickly see who is logging in and out 
excessively and re-train those users on proper use.

Thanks,
Steve