On Premise Software Help Resource : Help TopicsDetection Options

When a phone call is answered, the system needs to play the message a) immediately for live human pickup, and b) until a beep sound is detected for answering machine or voice mail system. Based on the answering party, the system then decides whether to play or wait. Unfortunately, there is no tone or signal over the phone line that indicates the pickup situation. Hence the system has to analyze the audio stream over the phone line in order to make a decision.

What can complicate the detection process

Strong background noise can be hard to filter out, especially it is from a human voice. A loud TV in the background, a second person talking to other person, etc, can mislead the system to make an answering machine prediction for human pickup.

On the other hand, a very weak answering machine volume can be diagnosed as background noise. So the system might think it is a live human pickup and play the message too early.

Another factor is that people answer the phone differently. There are really no fixed patterns or even regular patterns to follow. People from different countries, from different ethnic groups also answer the phone differently.

Answering machine messages and voicemail prompts are very different too.

Phone company messages are also complicated. Some announcements start with a disconnected beep sound, others with a different beep, and the rest do not even have one.

The system has to make a decision in real time

The system has to analyze the audio stream in real time so it can respond as soon as possible. This in certain degree limits what kind of algorithm the system can deploy. It is much harder to do it in real time with partial audio streams.

The system does make mistakes

As you can see, the prediction algorithm is based on statistics data. There is no guarantee the prediction is correct. We can always improve the accuracy and make the system more intelligent, but to reach 100% accuracy is impossible using today�s technology. The best system for prediction is the human perception system. But even humans make mistakes from time to time.

The choice is based on your application

In order to make the system more responsive to human pickup, something has to give. And this something is the accuracy for answering machine detection. If you care more about live human pickup and you can tolerate more mistakes for answering machine, then you can make the algorithm more responsive to humans.

Make it most responsive for live human pickup

On an extreme case, you can instruct the system not to do any answering machine vs. human analysis. Whenever the system hears a voice, it can start playing the message right away. Of cause, the system still needs some short time to recognize the human voice, filtering out the background noises, etc. The drawback is of this approach is that all answering machines will be treated as humans. The message will be played immediately after an answering machine answers the call. There will be no message, or only partial message, left on answering machines.

To set this option, please select Setup > Options from the gateway main menu, then choose the Detection tab. Move the sliding control bar to the position marked Most aggressive.

The biggest problem of this approach is that no answering machine will be recognized. For general usage, this setting is not recommended.

Make it more aggressive more human pickup

The default setting is the balanced approach for humans vs. answering machines. This is the default setting and it is recommended for general usage. The system will try to make a prediction as soon as possible.

You can make the system to be more aggressive on human pickup without totally losing the ability of answering machine detection. You can set it prediction to be �more aggressive� on humans. In this setting, the system will try to make a prediction as soon as the audio is likely to be humans. But there will be more mistakes for answering machines.

On Premise Software Help Resource : Help TopicsControl Options

These options are used for remote access (Enterprise Edition).

Remote connect password: password used when remote application, such as BroadcastByPhone, to connect and use the gateway.

Schedule Preference

Area code preferences for accepting outbound calls.

Only accespt calls of the following area code: A comma separated list of area code. If the area code of a phone number is not in the list, the call request will be rejected.

Exclude calls from the following area code: A comma separated list of area code. If the area code of the phone number is in the list, the call request will be rejected.

Manually click the Start button to run gateway: If you use Voicent program only from time to time, you can set this option to speed up your Windows start up time. It does take some time for the gateway to get started.

On Premise Software Help Resource : Help TopicsCall Transfer Options

With Voicent BroadcastByPhone Professional Edition or Enterprise Edition, you can set up call transfer. The system supports two call transfer mode:

• (1) Call transfer based on services on the telephone line
• (2) Call transfer on the same line by utilizing your computer

For service based call transfer, please call your phone company first for the dialing prefix and suffix. The settings listed in the dialog window are for setting up Voicent Gateway for using Vonage Call transfer service. When the person receiving the call presses a key for call transfer, the system will automatically dial the call transfer sequence. In this example, the system will dial #90, followed by 16501112222, followed by #. The call will then be transferred to the phone number 16501112222.

Suggestions for setting up service based call transfer

• 1). Connect a regular phone to the modem PHONE jack
• 2). Use the regular phone to call another phone number, such as your cell phone
• 3). Try call transfer with the regular phone.

If the call transfer does not work, then please contact your phone company.

Next please try to use the software to call. Once the call is connected, pickup the regular telephone that is connected to the modem PHONE jack. Please listen to the phone message when the modem is trying to make a call transfer.

If call transfer works with a regular phone, there is no reason it will not work with a modem. Voicent software simply drives the modem to simulate the key press. So all you need to do is to make sure the modem dials the same sequence of key press and at the right time.

The most common problem is that the modem dials the number too soon. For example, some service requires the press of the key, then wait for the dial tone, then press the phone number. If the modem is dialing too early before the dial tone, the phone line might not get all the phone numbers. To delay the dialing, you can add comma after the prefix. By picking up the phone that is connected to the modem, you can hear whether the modem is dialing too early or not.

The second problem is that some services (Vonage) require a 11 digit number for call transfer even it is a local number. Again, it is useful to listen to the phone connected to the modem, you can hear what is going on the the line.

Same line call transfer

The settings here are for setting up Voicent Gateway for transferring the call to the same phone line. When the person receiving the call presses a key for call transfer, the system will put person on hold, paying the On-hold message; the system will then pop up an alert window and play the selected ring sound on your computer speaker; you can pick up the telephone that is connected to the modem to talk to the person on the line.

This is usually used for AgentDialer in predictive dialing mode. With agent dialer, the default on hold message and transfer message can be overwritten when the dialing starts.

Do not show pop up window on this computer: If you have Enterprise Edition, you can log in from a remote machine using Voicent RemoteAgent so the call transfer alert window will pop up on the remote computer. If nobody sits in front of the gateway computer, set this option. Otherwise, the popup window will be shown in both computers.

Using 3 Way Calling Service

If you do not have call transfer service from your phone company, you can try to use 3-way calling. But using 3 way calling services have severer limitations.

1). By nature of the 3 way calling service, the modem phone line cannot be freed for the next call.

2). For some 3 way services, if the transferred call is not picked up in time, and the suffix is pressed, the 3 way calling will fail. So you have to add enough delay (comma) before the suffix. Voicent Gateway will give about 4 to 5 seconds delay before the suffix is dialed by the modem. You probably will need to add extra delays in most cases.

3). The modem will not disconnect when the other two parties have hang up their phones. Voicent system will disconnect the modem when there is enough silence from the phone line. It is set to 1 minute. So there will be at least 1 minute delay before the next phone call can be made from the system.

Call transfer when using Skype

For same line call transfer, the setting is the same as settings for modems.

When choosing service based call transfer, there is no need for prefix and suffix.

You can use either a Skype name or a regular phone number (Use SkypeOut) for the transfer.For example, skype:echo123, or 14081112222.

There are Knowledge Base articles that related to setting up call transfer.