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Routing Zendesk Talk calls to multiple agents at the same time

Answered


Posted Jan 04, 2017

We need the ability to have calls routed to all available agents when they arrive, not just one person that is available. This is due to the fact we don't want customers waiting for an agent to accept or decline a call before bouncing to the next agent to decide the same thing. If the call was notified to all available agents, then the call would be answered much quicker and improve the customers experience of the system.


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@... no updates? Most voted item and no solution for this? Also no replies from Zendesk team for years?

2


We moved to Zendesk Talk recently and we are looking for this functionality as well. 

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Hi, do you have an update on how to prioritize incoming calls for a certain line regardless of which agent is online? So if I prioritize Sales Line, the support team/agent would be able to answer that call first over any calls to Support Line? 

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Round robin has a strong potential to wreck our SLA, if we're not careful.

We have a small team with agents that also work on other tasks and projects, and can not always be behind their desks. There is always someone who can answer calls immediately, but that someone may be last in line. Whenever someone forgets to set their status to unavailable when they leave their desk (which happens, we're human), round robin causes trouble.

It will then cause longer waiting times for our clients, often troubled people that are nervous to reach out for help, or otherwise in distress when they call us. Having to wait longer for someone to pick up gives them more time to give up.

Simultaneous routing would be so incredibly helpful, and I would say an essential option to have. When we were looking into Zendesk, it didn't occur to me to check if it's possible to have calls routed simultaneously to multiple agents, because of course you can.

Well, you can't.

I feel a bit stupid for not checking for simultaneous routing before we signed the contract. But now I found this thread going back years, and which does make it seem stupid essential, yet the people at Zendesk do nothing to actually make it happen.

This and other lacks (such as a proper Talk app) which are not prioritized, make it seem like they're not in it for smaller companies that require flexible solutions, for whom these would be no-brainers, and possibly deal-breakers.

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The thing for us that is harder to explain to our staff is that you can't pick up a call after the 30 seconds have passed. There is absolutely no option for you to pick it up after that.

Lately we even had issues with some calls not being offered to anybody that is available. That is just a bug, the caller is stuck in queue and we can't do anything about it.

The thing that would solve both points: just make a visual queue with the unattended callers, where agents can pick them up, even after their 30 seconds round robin time has passed, or where you can pick up a call while it is being offered to another person. A bit like the talk/live_calls interface, but for calls that are not yet being served. It can't be that hard to create and it would solve a lot of issues and requests.

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Even easier than that, just allow an option to ring all the available agents at once. That is very, very easy to implement. Whoever picks up the call first gets to answer. Have a dropdown option to change / enable this behaviour and it's done.

That change would solve the vast majority of the use cases mentioned in this thread. It's called Hunt Group functionality and is a standard feature of most business phone systems.

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@... can you comment about whether any of these suggestions are in the roadmap or not. Honestly feel you'll be losing customers because of this so it really is in your interests to respond.

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Good to know there's a name for what we need. Thanks, @...!

In case someone from Zendesk does keep an eye on this, what I forgot to mention in my previous post is that we have a day team during office hours, and one or two agents working from home on nights and weekends. If a daytime-agent doesn't log off properly, they remain in the rr-queue, adding unnecessary waiting time for callers all night, or even all weekend.

The agents working from home generally go about their daily/nightly business, and have the occasional calls transferred to their mobile (hence our hopes for a Talk app). They won't be sitting behind a desk to keep an eye on things, and it's very unlikely they'll notice when a daytime agent is still in queue.

All in all this makes for a delicate setup which requires active monitoring, while we had expected something quite a bit more hands-off and modern. I'm sorry to say we're rather disappointed.

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I'm still getting email updates on this post after I commented in agreement 3 years(!) ago. For those just joining now, community managers were responsive 3-4 years ago, but the response was always that simultaneous-ring style calling was not on any future roadmaps. Then, the responses from the Zendesk side on this comment stopped altogether. It's clear, to me at least, that this is not a priority for the Zendesk development team.

I made a comment back then that I, too, didn't do my homework when onboarding Zendesk, out of assumption that this sort of ring style was a standard on all business phone systems.

3 years later, we're moving on to a different suite that suits our workflow better and has a more aggressive roadmap that aligns with our needs.

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Hard to conclude anything else given the radio silence from Zendesk. I'm inclined to agree they don't see this as a priority.

Which system did you select in the end? Thinking we too may have to do the same.

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Same here, what are you moving to?.  Been asking for years, posted on this same thread years ago, still getting notifications.  My ZD rep has been great but can get no answers about adding the ring multiple option for Talk.  I would like to keep ZD AND add Talk, but this is a road block for our use case as well.

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@Sarah, we would love to know what system you are moving to as well. Super frustrated by the lack of this feature and the lack of any response from ZenDesk.

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@jennifer we were also massively frustrated by Zendesk Talk and so moved to Aircall. It integrates directly with Zendesk and has simultaneous routing (So can ring to all agents). Since moving 3 years ago,  Aircall  have launched regularly updates & features. We have been very happy with them.

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Thanks for the feedback @...

My old employer had a product strategy of not listening to customer requirements too.

It's a pity they're no longer around as they made some great products - even if people didn't want to use them.

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@Xexec Support @Zeb Stiles we were also really frustrated by Zendesk Talk and so moved to Aircall. It integrates directly with Zendesk and has simultaneous routing (So can ring to all agents). Since moving 3 years ago,  Aircall  have launched regularly updates & features. We have been very happy with them.

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Appreciate the update, @..., even though it's still far from what we were hoping for. Is simultaneous/hunt group routing at least still "in the backlog for future consideration"?

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I dont understand how this isnt a feature or being considered.  being able to ring multiple agents simultaneously is a must for us

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This is needed. Nobody wants to go to another provider for this

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@Nicole Butcaris @Tours we were also massively frustrated by Zendesk Talk and so moved to Aircall. It integrates directly with Zendesk and has simultaneous routing (So can ring to all agents). Since moving 3 years ago,  Aircall  have launched regularly updates & features. We have been very happy with them.

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Posting here... again, years later.  We love Zendesk and would LOVE to use TALK too!  I have too many outside integrations to worry about as it is & I hate my current VOIP solution.  Please make this (seemingly small) adjustment Zendesk.  I am a customer of nearly 10 years!  Combine our continued usage with all the other customers on this thread... Maybe you can do an analysis on how much this one feature could bring to you.

Happy Holidays!

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I also need this function on zendesk talk right away!

Thank you.

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