An IVR is an interactive voice response system. It is a “voice robot” that greets callers and asks them to press a key on their keypad to be directed to the desired destination.
For example: “Press 1 for sales, press 2 for technical support.”
Access the IVR menu
To access the section where you can create a voice server:
- Click the Applications icon
- Click “Apps”
- Click “IVR Menu”
Set Up an Interactive Voice Response System
Once you’re in the “IVR Menu” section, click “Add an IVR Menu.”
Main Configurations
Next, fill in the fields that allow you to configure your IVR menu:
- Name: Enter the name of the IVR
- Extension: generated automatically and cannot be changed
- Long announcement: Select the voice server’s welcome announcement (see the article “Importing Custom Announcements“)
- Exit action: Choose the action that will be triggered once the voice server has finished. For example, you can restart the IVR or ring an extension.
Set the IVR menu keys
- Option: Enter a digit or number using the keyboard to select the option
- Destination: Action triggered when the person selects this option
- Order
- Description
- Add: Add a row to create a new option
Other configuration options
- Timeout: cuts off the IVR after X milliseconds
- Tone: Select the sound or message played when the call is transferred to the destination
- Number prefix: Display a prefix that will appear on the recipient’s phone(s) before the caller’s number
- Enabled: Enable or disable this IVR
- Direct Dial: Specify whether callers can call registered extensions directly
Once you’ve created your IVR, you can route calls from one or more phone numbers to that IVR. To do this, see the article “Set Up Your Phone Numbers.”
Since the IVR is now available as an extension, you can also set it up as an action from any other extension (ring group, another IVR, time-based conditions, etc.). This opens up nearly endless possibilities. For example, you can create a multi-level IVR and other complex routing scenarios.
