📞Outbound

The Outbound interface allows users to view completed and pending outbound call lists, to view outbound status for completed outbound calls, and to queue outbound calls manually through CSV upload.

Navigating to Outbound

Outbound calls can only be made when an application has been deployed.

From the Deployments page, locate the application you wish to deploy in the Deployments Table, then select its outbound icon (). The Outbound Queue page will be displayed. Your application's name and the Queue Calls button will be displayed, as shown in the following image.

Outbound Overview

Fuse makes it possible to automate outgoing calls with your digital voice channel. Behind the scenes outbound calling is a little bit different from handling inbound calls.

There are several different components to understand when developing applications for outbound calling, including:

• how the outbound call queuing platform works

• how to use the outbound APIs to queue calls

• how to use the API options to trigger different behaviors

• how to get the results of your calls

The Outbound Call Queuing Process

Basic Outbound Call Process

Every Fuse application has its own outbound calling queue. Outbound calls in Fuse are queued on a per application deployment basis.

Here are the basic steps of the outbound call process:

1. A call is queued by sending a phone_number POST variable to the application deployment’s queue API. This also returns a unique call_id.

2. The call is inserted into the queue and put into the queued state while waiting for idle outbound capacity.

3. When idle outbound capacity is available the call is taken off the queue, dialed, and put into into the dialing state.

4. When the call is answered it is placed into the connected state and the associated application executes.

5. When the call disconnects it is placed in the completed state.

What You Will Need

1. A fuse application

2. A deployment created for the application. A phone number is not needed to for outbound deployment. See Creating a New Deployment for more information.

How to start an outbound call

There are 2 ways to start an outbound call

1. Manual queuing through a CSV upload
2. Queuing through APIs

Queuing through Fuse API

Fuse API supports both single call queuing and bulk call queuing.

If you plan to queue more than one call at a time, use the Queue Multiple Calls API Method. Looping the Single Call API for individual calls can cause DDoS, which will result in all calls failing.

If you want to use Fuse's APIs to queue outbound calls, go into the Outbound () section of the deployment to see your deployment configuration. You will need both the application id and the deployment id to use the outbound APIs.

Advanced Outbound Call Features

For more information on the different settings you can set for an outbound call, please visit the Outbound Parameters page.

Understanding Callee Types and Outbound Statuses

The callee is the recipient of an outbound call. Plum Voice attempts to determine the type of callee (also referred as callee type), whether human, answering machine, etc. This information can be useful for determining an appropriate greeting or knowing whether a call was answered.

An outbound call is considered 'completed' when callee types are:

1. voice: the call was answered by a person

2. answeringmachine: the call went to voicemail

3. fax: the call detected a fax machine tone

For best user experience it is best to add callee type detection to your application.

An outbound call is considered 'failed' when callee types are:

1. busy: the line is in use

2. noanswer: the call was not picked up and did not go to voicemail

3. informationtone: the call detected an information tone; causes may include all circuits busy, number was disconnected, etc.

4. linefailure: similar to information tone, the call detected a failure when calling the number

In rare cases, an outbound call may produce miscellaneous callee types:

1. noattempt: this can cause an 'uncalled' or 'failed' status and occurs when campaign windows are too short for the amount of calls or cancelling the queue

2. unknown: this can cause a 'completed' or 'failed' status and occurs when our platform cannot determine the proper callee type