[asterisk-users] Basic asterisk Autodialer?

[Rob Schall]

shawnl at up.net wrote:
> I'm looking for an easy way to make asterisk perform as a basic
> (broadcast)autodialer.
>
> Basically all I want to do is give it a list of phone #'s and a
> pre-recorded message and have it call each one and play the message or
> leave it on the person's answering machine.  
>
> The people I'll be calling are all our customers, etc. so I don't need
> to do any do-not-call checking.  Just call and play the message and
> move on.  Trying to find a way to notify a couple hundred customers
> that their service has been changed.
>
> Anyone have any easy ways to do this?  I already have a functioning
> asterisk server with a POTS interface, etc.
>
>
> thanks
>
> Shawn
>
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This can be done with an easy script and call files.... However.... The 
problem you'll run into is with waiting for an answering machine. To my 
knowledge, there is no way to listen for "the beep". So you have 2 
options. First, you have it dial the other person and when it "connects" 
just let her rip and hopefully it wasn't an answering machine. The 
situation is okay when a person is picking up at the other end. Or 
second, you could have it wait for "connect", then have it wait 10 
seconds, then play. In most cases, this is usually okay. The problem 
there is that if its a person who picks up, they will hear dead error 
for 10 secs. You could have have a long message that says.... "please 
hold for message from 'your company'" then have it wait for 10 seconds, 
then play. This kind of covers both bases, but no guarantees people 
aren't just going to hang up on it.

Hopefully this helps a little.