This article provides guidance for NHSmail Teams Phone System Administrators who wish to create, edit, update, and delete Auto Attendant policies for their organisation/s.
Auto Attendants are policies which direct people who call in to a menu system so that they can be connected to the right department, person, or the operator within your organisation. When creating an Auto Attendant, you can choose greetings, set-up menus, and choose how to redirect calls.
Auto Attendant policies can be created and configured through the Phone System Power App as per your organisation’s requirements. This article will outline how to complete the following actions:
Adding a new Auto Attendant
1. Log in to the Phone System Power App and select ‘Auto Attendants’ from the Home screen.
2. You will be directed to the Auto Attendants landing screen where you will have the option to Add, View/Edit and Delete Auto Attendants.
Please be aware of the following NHSmail Teams Phone System configuration permissions for Primary and Local Phone System Administrators.
If you are a Teams Phone System Primary Admin, you have the permissions to complete the following actions:
- View Phone System policies for your own organisation and any other organisations of which you are a Teams Phone System Admin
- Add / Create new policies for your organisation
- Assign policies created for your organisation to any other organisations of which you are a Teams Phone System Admin
- Edit policies for your organisation and any other organisations of which you are a Teams Phone System Admin
- Delete policies for your organisation and any other organisations of which are a Teams Phone System Admin
If you are a Teams Phone System Local Admin, you have the permissions to complete the following actions:
- View Phone System policies for your own organisation
- Add / Create new policies for your own organisation
- Edit policies for your own organisation
- Delete policies for your own organisation
For more information on the Primary and Local Teams Phone System Administrator Roles, please see this article.
3. To add a new Auto Attendant, select the ‘+ Add’ from the toolbar. You will be directed to the Add Auto Attendant screen.
If this is the first time you are adding an Auto Attendant for your organisation, the summary box will be empty. However, if you know that Auto Attendants for your organisation have been added previously but are not showing please click the ‘Refresh’ button.
Each summary / drop down box displaying policies is limited to showing 500 policies, although all policies created will be searchable.
4. On the Add Auto Attendant screen, you will need to provide the following information and set parameters which suit your organisation’s requirements:
- Name – Enter a name for the new Auto Attendant. There are no naming conventions which you need to follow for this, however all Auto Attendant policies will be prefixed with your organisation’s ODS code once created
- Choose an Operator. There can only be one Operator per Auto Attendant. If you select an Operator here, the value configured will be reflected in the Menu Options.
- Enable or disable Voice Inputs
Choose a Resource Account to associate to the new Auto Attendant. A drop-down list will provide a list of the Resource Accounts available.
All Auto Attendants must have an associated Resource Account to be successfully configured. Follow this link to find out how to configure a Resource Account.
5. Once you have completed the Add Auto Attendant screen as per your requirements, select ‘Next’ to be directed to the next screen.
6. On the following screen, you will be able to set the Call Flow by selecting the greeting message type suitable for your organisation. Click ‘Next’ once complete.
Depending on your selection, a variety of dynamic options will appear. Selecting ‘Not greeting’ will simply allow you to proceed to the next screen. Selecting ‘Play an audio file’ will provide the option to upload an audio file as a greeting (.WAV, .MP3 and .WMA formats only, and no larger than 5mb). ‘Add a greeting message’ will provide a box to type out the text you wish to have as the greeting (required to be between 10-1000 characters long).
7. The next screen will show several options of how the call can be routed. Subsequent options will be different depending on the routing issue you choose.
If ‘Redirect’, or ‘Play menu options’ is selected and you wish to route to a user (person in organisation), the user is required to have assigned to them; a Phone System licence, a Calling Plan Licence if they are using Calling Plans as their PSTN connection strategy and a phone number. If these are removed from the user (or if the user leaves the organisation), the Auto Attendant will become corrupted and not work. It is organisations’ responsibility to ensure that information they provide which is then used by the Power App to complete and deliver administrative functions is up to date.
8. If ‘Disconnect’ is chosen, select ‘Submit’ to create the Auto Attendant.
9. If ‘Redirect’ is chosen, select where you would like the call to be redirected to and the ODS code from the drop-down lists and then click ‘Submit’ to process changes.
10. If ‘Play menu options’ is chosen, toggle to choose either text greeting message or an audio message.
If you select a text greeting message, you will need to type in the message in the Greeting message box.
If you select an audio message, you will need to attach and upload an audio file.
Once this screen has been completed, select ‘Next’.
11. You will then be required to set up dial keys for your menu options. You can set up dial keys for the numbers 0-9. For example, ‘for sales, press or say 1’, ‘for services, press or say 2.’
At least one dial key needs to be configured. Select ‘Submit’ once you have set up all required dial keys.
12. Upon clicking ‘Submit’, you will be directed to a success screen confirming your Auto Attendant has been successfully added.
Advanced Settings (Optional)
After creating an Auto Attendant, Phone System Administrators can also choose to configure advanced optional settings such as Holiday Call Settings, Business Hours Settings, and Dial Scope Settings.
These optional settings can be found at the right of the Auto Attendants summary box.
Add Holidays
By adding holidays, you can set up your Auto Attendants to play greetings and messages for specific holiday dates, and you can also configure how to redirect the calls if required.
Please follow the steps below to add holiday settings to an Auto Attendant.
1. Navigate to the Auto Attendants landing screen and select ‘+ Holiday settings’ for the Auto Attendant that you wish to add holiday settings for.
2. On the next screen, you will be required to provide the following information:
- Name – Please provide a name for this holiday (for example, Spring Bank Holiday).
- Start Date
- Start Time
- End Date
- End Time
Select ‘Next’ once you have completed the fields to continue.
3. Next, on the Holiday Call Flow screen choose what type of greeting message should play to callers during this holiday period.
Depending on your selection, there will be a variety of dynamic options that will appear. ‘Play an audio file’ will provide the option for you to upload an audio file as a greeting (.WAV, .MP3 and .WMA formats only, no larger than 5mb). ‘Add a greeting message’ will provide you with a box to type out the text you wish to have as the greeting (between 10-1000 characters long).
4. Once you have chosen your greeting message, select ‘Next’ to proceed to the next screen.
Regardless of your greeting message choice, you will be directed to the Edit Auto Attendant screen, where you will need to choose how to route incoming calls during the holiday period.
5. If you select ‘Disconnect’ and then ‘Submit’, calls will not be routed, and you will be directed to a success screen confirming that your Holiday settings have been saved.
If you select ‘Redirect’, you will be able to choose from a drop-down list whether to redirect the call to an external phone number, voicemail, person in organisation or voice app.
6. Upon clicking ‘Submit’, you will be directed to a success screen confirming that your Holiday settings for your Auto Attendant have been successfully saved.
Business Hours Settings
Business hours can be set for each Auto Attendant. If business hours aren’t set, all days and all hours in the day are considered business hours because a 24/7 schedule is set by default. Business hours can be set with breaks in time during the day. All hours that are not set as business hours are considered after-hours.
You can set different incoming call-handling options and greetings for after-hours. Although this is not required, by setting up after-hour settings, you can set up a person in your organisation to answer calls when a caller wants to talk to another person, or you can direct callers via Voice app to another linked Auto Attendant or Call Queue.
Please follow the steps below to configure business hours for an Auto Attendant.
1. Navigate to the Auto Attendants landing screen and select ‘+ Business hour settings’ for the Auto Attendant you wish to configure business hours for.
2. You will be taken to the screen to set up the business hours for each day of the week. Select from the drop-down lists to add start and end times.
Multiple time slots can be added per day by selecting the ‘+’ icon. Select ‘Next’ to continue.
3. On the Business Hours Call Flow screen, you will be able to choose the greeting message callers hear if they call outside of business hours. Choose a greeting message and then select ‘Next’.
Depending on your selection, there will be a variety of dynamic options that will appear. ‘Play an audio file’ will provide the option for you to upload an audio file as a greeting (.WAV, .MP3 and .WMA formats only, no larger than 5mb). ‘Add a greeting message’ will provide you with a box to type out the text you wish to have as the greeting (between 10-1000 characters long).
4. On the next screen, you will be able to choose how the call will be routed outside of the business hours you have selected.
If you select ‘Disconnect’ and then ‘Submit’, calls will not be routed, and you will be directed to a success screen confirming that your settings have been saved.
If you select ‘Redirect’, you will be able to select where you would like the call to be redirected to. Select one of the options and then configure the require fields. Select ‘Submit’ to save your choices. You will then see a success screen confirming that your choices have been saved successfully.
5. If you select ‘Play menu options’, toggle to select whether the greeting message should be text (if so, you will then need to insert text message) or an audio message (you will need to upload and attach file).
Select ‘Next’ to continue.
6. You will then be directed to the Business Hours Call Flow screen where you will need to set up dial keys for the play menu options If you selected an Operator when you created the Auto Attendant, then that choice will be available to select in the ‘Redirect to’ field. If you did not select an Operator when you created the Auto Attendant, then you can select one here.
At least one dial key needs to be configured before you will be able to proceed. For example, ‘for sales, press or say 1, for services, press or say 2’.
7. Upon clicking ‘Submit’, you will be directed to a success screen confirming that your Business Hours settings have been saved successfully.
Dial Scope
You can configure Dial Scopes for Auto Attendants via the NHSmail Teams Phone System Power App.
A dial scope defines which users are available in the directory when a caller uses dial-by-name or dial-by-extension. You can set up the users or groups that will be listed and available in your organisation’s directory. When callers use Dial-by-name and search for a person by their name using their voice or keypad, they will then be transferred to the users that have the Teams app installed.
Only users who are licensed and assigned a number can be assigned to an Auto Attendant.
Please follow the steps below to configure a Dial Scope for an Auto Attendant.
By default, all Auto Attendants will be configured with the ‘allusersgroup.ODS’ code security group. If you do not update the list of users you would like the Dial Scope to apply to, then the Dial Scope will apply to all users at your organisation.
1. Navigate to the Auto Attendant landing screen and select ‘+ Dial Scope’ for the Auto Attendant that you wish to configure the dial scope for.
2. Select the ODS code of the organisation to which the user group you would like to be included in the organisation directory belongs to, and then select the user group from the second drop-down list. Select ‘Submit’ to continue.
3. Next, you will see a success screen confirming that your settings have been saved successfully.
Editing an Auto Attendant
To edit an existing Auto Attendant you will need to update the settings that were configured when it was created.
1. Navigate to the Auto Attendants landing screen and select from the list the Auto Attendant you wish to edit. You can use the ODS code search to help find the Auto Attendant you are looking for. Select ‘View/Edit’ from the toolbar.
2. You will then be taken to a screen to edit the configured settings for that Auto Attendant. Scroll down the screen to review and edit all settings. Select ‘Next’ once this is complete.
You will not be able to edit the name of the Auto Attendant.
3. Continue through further screens to edit any of the other settings of the Auto Attendant which were configured when it was first created.
4. Once you have edited all options as required for the Auto Attendant and have selected ‘Submit’ on the final Edit Auto Attendant Flow screen, you will see a success screen confirming that your settings were saved successfully.
Deleting an Auto Attendant
1. Navigate to the Auto Attendants landing screen and select the Auto Attendant you wish to delete. You can use the ODS code search function to help with this is required. Select the ‘Delete’ option from the toolbar.
2. A pop-up screen will appear asking you to confirm that you wish to delete the selected Auto Attendant. Select ‘Delete’ to confirm.
3. A success screen will appear confirming that the Auto Attendant was deleted.
| Last Reviewed Date | 04/04/2023 |
