Caller Id Changer

[Raj]

So I have some clients that have asked for this feature.

Where they have 1 phone setup with one main DiD for their company. But they are starting a new business. We get them a new DiD but they don't want to pay for another Line. 

I know what he is trying to do ,as some legacy PBX's allowed you to hit 1 and it used LIne 1 to dial out of that DiD and press Line 2 to use it's outbound caller id and so on.

Is there a way to do this on Kazoo ? 

Thanks.

R-

[Karl Stallknecht]

The answer I have received from 2600hz in the past is that the only way to do this is to setup another device in Kazoo (or now Monster) and then manually add/provision that line to another line key.

[Raj]

But then we are charged for another line, i.e means we have to charge the customer. This is not something that sells like hot cakes but when we have migrated people off of key based phone systems or old nortel PBX's they sure love that legacy feel.

I lost 2 deals as kazoo was not able to mimic the key based system. Asterisk along with Yeahlink phones would have solved the problem but,  i sure don't want to run or managed physical PBX's any more.

R-

[Karl Stallknecht]

I completely agree with you Raj. What I previously stated was just what 2600hz has told us in the past on this matter.

[Aaron Gunn]

Hi Raj,
This is a great idea, Karl has answered with the technical solution to getting this set up currently. I will put in a Product request for a way to provide this functionality without adding an extra device charge, and we will update this ticket if the functionality is going to be provided.

[esoare]

So I figured out another way of doing this.

It adds one more step for the user.

But it adds some customization on the phones WEB-GUI (at least the Yealinks) because Auto Provisioner doesn't have the option to do Combo-Keys as DTMF.

Not pretty, but it does make it possible for a user to use their phones and change their caller ID.

IF it's just 1 other line, then it will be programming three buttons, and they just press the 3 buttons, then enter the number they want to call.

1) Create a call flow with an internal extension
a. Put a Prepend with the number the customer wants to show
b. Go to DISA (enter an arbritrary code)
c. Save.

2) Go to the Phone WEB-GUI
a. Create a button with Speed Dial to the Internal Extension (Name whatever)
b. Create a button with DTMF with the DISA CODE + # (Name PIN CODE)

User Presses Speedial
They Hear "Please enter you code...."
They press the PIN CODE button
They Hear Dial Tone
They enter the phone number they want to call.

Wallah!

All that without creating another Device!

WHEN / IF, DTMF is added as an option in Advanced Provisioner, you won't need to do the Phone Web GUI.

Hope that helps...and yes, I did take 1.25 hours out of my day to do this, pics, and type up the how to! :)
esoare out

[Karl Stallknecht]

Hmm, interesting. I tried using prepend a few months ago and it didn't seem to work on outbound calls. We were trying to have a customer see based on the caller ID on their cell phone that a call was being forwarded from their office, so we tried using a prepend to add like a * or 0 or something prior to the number before forwarding the call to the external number, and the prepend didn't do anything.

So I am guessing what is happening in your example is that the prepend is basically pushing out the default caller ID data?

[esoare]

Nope

Your effort is different than what Raj was talking about...This is not call forwarding, but calling out from a phone and wanting to show one of your "other" lines, instead of a) your main number, b) the users number, c) the device's number!

If you made the call flow a Dynamic CLID, u would need to enter number then # (though, if you do a full 10 digits, it doesn't require the #) on the phone pad, I setup the yealink to do a DTMF with the 10 digits of the Caller ID wanting to be shown.

Then user puts in a "1 digit + #" DISA code.

User hears Dial Tone, dials 10 digits out, and the Call gets placed using the Dynamic Caller ID of the "second line"

This works Consistently.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I placed a ten digit cell number off of Verizon in the pictured Pre-Pend above. It was showing that cell phone number when I called from that T42G phone the first time.

The pictures above with the Pre-Pend and digits entered in, then the DISA. Has an interesting bug. If you build the callflow. The first time you use it, the CLID displays properly. But after that first try, the number 919-692-6062 shows up afterwords, or "UNKNOWN"...consistently... which if you search that, bots use it. :) Not sure why that happens... I'll open up a support case on this.

Esoare

[esoare]

Created Bug Report JIRA-Kazoo-4600 (That one has a good number, so maybe it will be fixed:) )

Create a Advanced - CallFlow with an Extension
Create a Prepend
In Caller-ID Number Prefix: place a 10 digit phone number
Create a DISA
In Pin enter PIN CODE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

USE:
User calls the CallFlow. System asks for the System Pin Code.
User enter system Pin Code.
They hear Dial tone.
User dials number to call.
Call Completes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The First Time that Caller ID to the receiving party shows the Prepend number in the Call Flow.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bug:
After 1 use of the CallFlow.
All other calls, show 919-692-6062 or "Unknown", i/e no Number provided.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Travis Hawkins]

We have a client who is a call center for about 40 other companies.  Each company is provided a dedicated DID and we use the prepend functionality to show the name of the company the caller was calling, so whoever answers the phone can respond to the caller appropriately ("Thank you for calling [insert company name here]).  This way the caller doesn't realize they've called an outsourced call center.

The other part of that solution is the disa call flow module which we use similarly to what esoare stated.  The internal staff member dials the internal extension of the callflow that directs them to the disa module, they enter the DID they want to dial out with, then dial any number and the callee will see the appropriate caller id information instead of the default caller id which would be a different company.  We've been doing this for over a year and it works great.  The only issue is that the internal staff have to keep a cheat sheet of which DID corresponds which company so they know what number to dial out with, but it's not too big a deal.

[Travis Hawkins]

DynamicCLID, I don't think a Prepend on outbound calling will do anything.

[esoare]

Travis.

So the outgoing call flow is a Prepend? + DISA
or
a Dynamic-CLID? +DISA

Checkout the link below, it may be of interest.

https://helpcenter.2600hz.com/2600hz/...

esoare

[esoare]

OK.

Just another thought, if you want to sell some side cars and program them up. :)

On the Yealinks you can set a DSS Button for DTMF (which I would figure you could do on other phones to).

Setup DSS buttons for each of their clients DTMF with the 10 digit number for the client. Put the name of the client as the "Label".

Then, when the "Enter your number..." comes up from the system, the agent can press a button to put in the proper phone number, based on the client.

Perhaps your client would be willing to pay for that, since it would alleviate errors.

[Karl Stallknecht]

I can't get this to work :-( Are you able to help Travis?




I dial 32 from my phone and enter the caller ID (one of our clients instead of our office number), I then dial the DISA code and dial my cell phone. My cell phone shows our office calling me, not the client's DID.

Any ideas what we are doing wrong?

[esoare]

Karl,

I did break it so that it wouldn't show the Dynamic CID that I entered. Make sure the DISA doesn't have the "Use Account Caller ID" box "Checked".

Save after changing.

If that doesn't fix it, not sure...

[Travis Hawkins]

Hey Karl, sorry that's not working for you.  Here's a couple of screenshots of a setup that's working for us.

Call flow:



Here's the DISA config (it's blank but that works for us for this client):



Like esoare stated, make sure the 'Use Account Caller ID' is NOT checked.  Also, are you calling from a number that's assigned to the same account you're calling from or are you trying to specify a caller id number from a sub account/client account?  We don't actually use this feature at our office, but we have a few clients who use it without issue.

Good luck!

Travis

[Darren Schreiber]

So, this one is kind of funny. I can't believe you guys like this.

DISA was supposed to be for REMOTE people to call in and then call out, deferring international charges to their provider/company/etc. Our implementation of it was originally designed simply so a customer with a cell phone could call-thru on a pre-paid style system, preserve their phone's Caller ID (we did NOT originally change it) and then have the international call charge to someone else. It was actually from back in the day when cell phone companies were still pitching Family & Friends plans, where you could have up to 5 numbers that were free to call. By making the DISA number one of the free numbers and making all your calls via it, you still kept your cell phone Caller ID but you could call the DISA number first, then the actual number you wanted to reach. Then all your calls were free.

Fast-forward a year or so and we started getting people who wanted to use this feature for what it historically is actually for, which is charging your company for your outbound calls while also appearing to be at the company / at your desk (i.e. having the Caller ID match the person calling out). Because DISA PIN codes are per-account/call-flow and have nothing to do with a user, we have no way to identify the "right" Caller ID to use for a particular user from the PIN. Therefore, we simply chose the easiest option (for times sake) and changed DISA to start masking the Caller ID if an account-wide Caller ID was set.

When we rolled that out, we got a call from a company (possibly you Michael? I'm not sure) who, unbeknownst to us, had been using the callflow editor to map Dynamic Caller ID + DISA (with no PIN) to a speed dial button on people's phones. When the user pushed the button, they heard a familiar dialtone, entered their Caller ID number (which was the Dynamic Caller ID module), then routed to DISA to dial out (with no PIN). Problem is, we didn't know people were using it in this way, and the upgrade we did just broke their setup because it forced the Caller ID to match the account and was no longer just "not touching" the Caller ID, meaning now the Dynamic Caller ID was being overwritten.

We really wanted DISA to have a consistent behavior, especially since it already seems to confuse people. So what we did is we added a hidden flag in the API that lets you make DISA NOT set Caller ID, and for everyone else, we made the default for DISA to use the Caller ID of the account by default.

Based on this thread, I am surprised at how popular this idea is. We have had a lot of comments about Caller ID recently for some reason. I'm wondering, before we decide how to "fix" this better, maybe you all could tell us WHY these people are changing their Caller ID? What is the actual use case? I feel like we keep going in circles with this feature and guessing as to what the actual use case is.

Then we could design something better that fits everyone's needs. My thoughts on the current DISA design is, by definition, it's now finally doing what it's supposed to do by default (based on how other systems work) and what you guys are doing with it is kind of a hack. I'd almost rather copy the module and make a new feature with a new name that's, like, "Custom Outbound Caller ID Dialer" or something (shorter).

But I don't know how to make that decision without understanding the use case. The ones I've heard so far are:
* Customer has multiple clients they represent and they want the Caller ID to reflect their client on outbound dialing
* Customer has multiple offices and they want the local number to appear for the office they're calling from

Those are the only two use cases I'm aware of.

[Karl Stallknecht]

That's literally exactly what I am doing Travis, but it doesn't work :-(

[Karl Stallknecht]

Hi Darren,

To chime in on two points:

We have never been able to get DISA to work in the manner we want it with caller ID, which is a customer, from a cell phone, needs to be able to dial out as their office caller ID and not their cell phone. Regardless of whether or not we check the "use account caller ID box" the caller ID that shows up is always that of the first phone that dialed into DISA. No idea why since I feel like we are doing everything correctly...?

The use case our customers have is "Customer has multiple offices and they want the local number to appear for the office they're calling from" - in our situation, the Washington, D.C. area basically has 3 states all within a few miles of each other. Most service companies for example will service all 3 states; however, many customers feel better knowing that the company is located in their own state. We have many customers who want to be able to have their Maryland area code show up when they call Maryland customers, versus the Virginia area code showing up when they call Virginia customers. Automating this would be SO cool, but not 100% necessary.

[Darren Schreiber]

When did you last try this? This was patched, at customers request (might have even been you?) last month I believe.

If you can point me to a callflow (feel free to send it in as a support ticket) we'll take a peak.

[Karl Stallknecht]

I tried this 10 minutes ago :-/ I'll send in a ticket.

[Travis Hawkins]

Great explanation Darren, thanks for that.  The customer who called in was actually us as we have the client who works as a call center for companies all over the country and requires the ability to call back their customers using the name and number of the company their representing at the time.

We're all for using a new module or a better solution based on customizing outbound caller id.  Unfortunately for us, the only other way to accomplish this currently (as I understand it) is to create a separate line appearance for each of their customers, but doing that requires each to be a new device since we can't provision multiple lines on a single device.  Of course that means paying for each additional device just to be able to add it as a line appearance, and having phones that can handle as many line appearance as we would need.

I realize this is all just based on our specific needs, but if there's a way to work on a better solution moving forward that would be fantastic.  Thanks for taking the time to read through our threads and responding!

Also, I'm with Karl on not getting the DISA to work by calling in from a cell phone to place a call using the office caller id.  I haven't tried it for quite a while so I'll setup a call flow and try it out again.  Thanks.

Travis

[Logicwrath]

I wanted to use PREPEND + DISA to change the outbound phone number.  It seems like it works 90% of the time.  Then about 10% of the time it shows either restricted or 919-692-6062 or 919-692-6063.

Any idea why this happens?  Does it have to do with the route the call takes or the 2600 LCR?

[Logicwrath]

Can we create 1 device for each DID and register it on many phones without issue?  The only use would be to change the outgoing caller-id with 1 click.  Would this introduce any kind of problems?

[esoare]

I know it's not API based, and you do have to have Yealinks (unless Polycom does DTMF's on Keys)

Using a CallFlow with -> Dynamic CLID -> Disa. You should be able to get 100% results.

Hope you get it working the other way though!

Example above.