Auto-Dialer Addon

Auto-Dialer addon lets you call an array of numbers automatically and when answered plays back a prerecorded message to the receiving end of the call.

It can be used in telemarketing.

Overview

When Auto-Dialer (AD) is installed – every user can use it.

User can find AD menu under PERSONAL MENU – Auto Dialer.

Main window shows user's campaigns:

User can Activate or Stop the Campaign by pressing or button near Campaigns status.

Campaign can only be Activated if it has free (not-called) numbers AND some Actions.

So please before activating Campaign import some Numbers and create Actions.

Add new Campaign

Add new campaign – let's you add new campaign:

Important fields here are:

• Start/Stop Times – when calls will be made
• Max Retries – how many times to retry unsuccessful call
• Retry Time – after how many seconds should system retry the call?
• Wait Time – how long to wait till the call will be answered
• Device – each Campaign should be assigned to Device in order for MOR to bill the call
• CallerID - what CallerID to put on calls

Numbers

Press on in Numbers column to check campaigns numbers:

User can import phone numbers from TXT file. Numbers should be in correct format.

In new Campaign there are no numbers, so press on Import numbers from file and you will have to select file to upload:

After uploading file you will see status of imported numbers:

You can delete all number by pressing Delete all numbers

If number is Completed, it is possible to reactivate it (tell system to call it again) by pressing icon near number.

Actions

Press in Actions column to access Campaign's actions:

In this window user programs the Actions for Campaign:

Types of Actions:

• WAIT – how many second to wait
• PLAY – play some file
• IVR - send call to IVR. It can be used to connect to some real person and give more choice to the callee. For example it is possible to play advertisement and tell user to press '1' to talk with real person about this advertisement or similar.
  • NOTE: This action is only available for admin, not for users (they can't have their own IVRs)

Admin interface

When Auto-Dialer (AD) is installed Admin can find Auto-Dialer under menu SETTINGS – Addons – Auto Dialer.

Here he can get view of all users campaigns:

The important info for each Campaign:

• Status – is Campaign Active or Stopped
• Run time – tells when calls will be made
• All other fields are self-explanatory

It is possible for admin to see the Actions for users Campaigns. Just press on Actions button.

Workflow

Each 5 minutes cron job is activated to check if any campaigns are activated.

If there are some active campaigns, script creates call files for the future.

It puts calls in time period in equal time periods, to load balance the work for Asterisk.

E.g. if you have 10 calls to make, script will execute them in 6s intervals to start all calls in 1 min time.

Variables in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin/mor.conf:

calls_one_time - How many calls to distribute per one minute - (PLEASE NOTE, this value is not for simultaneous calls! it has very different meaning which is explained below)

cron_interval - What is the interval of time in minutes in which we should 'put' calls

Example #1:

calls_one_time = 10
cron_interval = 1

That means that in 1 minute script will put 10 calls. So each call will be executed in 6s interval:

1st call: 0s
2nd call: 6s
3rd call: 12s
....
9th call: 54s
10th call: 60s

Example #2:

calls_one_time = 5
cron_interval = 2

That means that in 1 minute script will put 5 calls and it will do for 2 minutes. So each call will be executed in 12s interval:

1st call: 0s
2nd call: 12s
3rd call: 24s
4rd call: 36s
5th call: 48s
6th call: 60s
7th call: 72s
8th call: 84s
9th call: 96s
10th call: 108s

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NOTE: Auto-Dialer is not the tool to generate a lot of calls simultaneously. Auto-Dialer distributes calls in even intervals in some time period to minimize load on Asterisk.