Amazon Connect Tips, Tricks and Trouble Shooting!

Posted on July 24, 2019 by DrVoIP

What no Delete for Contact Flows?

One of the first discoveries you will make while configuring contact flows is that you can NOT delete a contact flow. Once it is created, you can “save as” but you cannot delete it. There is a good reason for this and hopefully by the end of this blog it will make sense to you. Out of the Box, Amazon Connect comes pre-configured with a wide variety of contact flows and system parameters. You will see this listed as sample and default in a newly created instance. If you poke around you will also see that a schedule of basic hours has been configured along with a basic queue. There are preconfigured security profiles and preconfigured routing profiles along with a small library of professionally recorded voice and music prompts.

This pre-configuration and population of basic and default parameters is done for a reason that also helps explain why you cannot delete anything after you create it! Assume you open a new Amazon Connect instance and following the setup menu, add a telephone number. Assign that number in the drop down window in the phone number configuration to point to the “Sample inbound flow (first call experience”. Then call the number. This Call flow will make use of most if not all of the default and sample contact flow listed in a fresh out of the box, unmodified Contact instance. Since we did not configure an agent or queue it draws on several preconfigured parameters including the “Default Customer Queue” which describes what a caller hears while waiting for an Agent to become available and the “Basic Queue” along with the “Basic Hours”.

How Amazon Connect stages Default Contact Flows

If you open the “Sample inbound flow (first customer experience)” note that it does NOT make use the “Default customer queue” step. How is that we hear it if it is not in the contact flow? When the call is transferred to an Agent we did not even configure yet (we are logged in as the Instance Administrator on a CCP softphone), we even hear the “Default agent whisper”. Nor did we configure a Queue? Likewise if we put the caller on hold we are tapping the “Default customer hold” contact flow. If we are in Call Wrap up, the caller would be hearing the “Default customer queue” contact flow while awaiting for an agent to become available.

This is the key reason you can not delete anything! To do so would jeopardize the stability of the Connect Instance. These defaults assure that configuration newbies cannot stray materially from the experience they intended to configure. While the Connect instance is setting up an outbound connection to the agent CCP softphone, and even longer if dialing an agent’s hard phone. The caller will hear the “Default customer queue” experience. We recommend that you get a “ring back” audio prompt and use that in either the default customer queue or the customer queue you create. We think it is a bit confusing for a caller to call in and hear music while being transferred. You should also note the possible impact on your inbound call statistics. Additionally, note that billing started the moment your caller hit the phone number regardless of the fact that they are not yet connected to an agent.

Creating and Modifying Contact Flows using “Save As”

Each of the Contact flows in an Amazon Connect instance has an Amazon Resource Number or ARN. This is a globally unique identification number and defines every contact flow in the instance. Generally, you will build a new contact flow from an existing one. To do this, you first open the contact flow you want to copy and do a save as. You have to pay attention here, or you will have a big problem! Some folks open a contact flow, change the name and make some modifications and then publish it! It will show up in your list of contact flows, but it will still have the ARN of the original contact flow even though you renamed it! This means that other contact flows that call on that original contact flow will now get all your changes! What you want to do is rename the contact flow and do a “save as” in this way you create a new ARN and will not be over writing the original contact flow.

Not all Contact flows have all contact flow Options?

There are about 9 different types of contact flows that you can create to meet your call flow requirements. If you create a new Contact Flow you need to understand that not all contact flow types will have all the contact flow options. For example if you are describing the experience you want a customer to have while in queue waiting for an agent to become available, you will open the “Default Customer Queue ” and do a “save as” to create your experience. Do not expect to find a “Transfer to Flow” option in the list of possible steps as that option is not available in this type of contact flow. The list of step options changes based on the type of contact flow you are creating, so keep this in mind!

Error Handling

Generally, every step in a Contact Flow has an error exit. We have found that it is best to create a Contact Flow named “error handling” and to use this as the solution to all of the options that you must provide an error exit.

Use Speech Markup Language for Text to Speech prompts!

As a consultant deploying call center and IVR solutions, one of the most frustrating aspects of the implementation is waiting for clients to get their voice prompts together! Generally we will not start an implementation until we have the prompts! Text to Speech is a life saver for deployment engineers. You can create prompts on the fly and let people test them, suggest modifications and really fine tune the prompts to achieve the desired level of customer care. When the prompts are all agreed to, you can then get them professionally voiced or not! We find that Amazon Polly is an excellent option for prompts but we also suggest that you use the Speech Synthesis Markup Language option. In all of the prompt areas you can choose between loading a Wave file, or using Text to Speech. When using Text to Speech you have the option of interpreting the text as text or as SSML. SSML enables you to add tags that can control the various components of speech including tone, pitch, speed and format. You may want a number read as a phone number for example, rather than a long integer. SSML is simple to configure and it very powerful. Learn to use it always and you will have very excellent results.

Don’t forget to assign outbound phone numbers to your Queues

In Queues in which Agents are expected to make out bound calls you must associate a phone number to that queue for outbound dialing. The Agent will not be allowed to make outbound calls if they do not have a phone number assigned to the queue. You can also try to put an outbound name in the same configuration area, but there is no guarantee that this name will be displayed to the CallED party. The phone number will most likely display to the CallED party, however names are provided by multiple options at both the carrier level and the end device level.

Trouble Shooting 101

When trouble shooting Amazon Connect contact flows your best friend is CloudWatch and Contact Flow Filters! Lets take a look at each of these tools to better understand how they work together to provide a history of how a specific call behaves. First while in the Connect dashboard you will find under “Metrics and Quality” you will find a TAB for “Contact Search” . Selecting this option will enable you to set search filters for the contact record you are trouble shooting. You can filter on the usual date and time parameters, but also by queue, and by call type and direction (Inbound, Outbound, Transfer, API, Call Back and Queue Transfer). The goal is to obtain the “ContactId” the key to all activity in the Connect Instance. If you know this ContactId you can just search for it and skip the filters. Optionally you can just “Search” and you will see a list of ContactId’ based on the default filter.

Now that you have the Contact ID you can move over to CloudWatch (this assumes you have enabled logging) and you can search for this ContactId record and follow the entire call flow from start to finish, Go to the CloudWatch service, click on Logs and then locate the “Log group” for your Amazon Connect Instance. This will pop a list of “Log streams” and “last event time”. Find a row that closely matches the date and time of your target ContactID and open that log stream by clicking on it.

Note that the time in the even stream is in UTC and matching log times is always interesting. In this example we searched for a particular Contact ID in the Connect dashboard and it shows that the call we are interested in had a “Initiation TimeStamp” of *7:46 PM” GMT/UTC or Zulu time (if you are military, which all mean the same time reference regardless of where you are located on the globe).

The Contact ID is a clickable link, and will bring up some information of interest as contained in the Contact Trace Record. There will be a Contact Summary, A recording if enabled with the location of the recording and a playback button, Connection Endpoint pairing and Queue information.

Heading over to CloudWatch and checking the respective Log Stream in the instance log group, we find that the time is being adjusted to the GMT offset of the time zone the Instance time reference, which in our case is GMT -7 hours! S o the Contact Filter Search in the Amazon Connect dashboard is being Time Stamped for GMT/UTC but the log is offset (Terminate at 7:46 PM in dashboard is listed at 12:48 in the CloudWatch logs). Keeping track of this time offset will drive you a bit nuts, but if you are aware of it, you can figure it out. SUMMARY – Look in Cloudwatch for the UTC offset in your Connect Instance and NOT the time stamped in the Contact Filter of your Amazon Connect dashboard!

When searching for records in the CloudWatch logs you will note that you can set it for ROWS or TEXT and you can also select to search by specific times and choose between UTC time or Local Time zone>

When you set your search by ROW you will get an orderly list of multiple Contact ID’s within the event range reported. Logs are posted about every minute or so. In an instance with a heavy call flow you are going to find many different Contact ID’s in that event range and will have to search for a specific record using a search filter in the format of “ContactId” = “ca822db4-98aa-4de3-9254-461177a6d259”. In Text mode you can also search using the CTRL F feature of your browser.

When you use the ROW mode you will get a list of Contact Flow steps that, by pushing the down arrow will open each step for inspection. This is necessary to see each step of your call flow, what Contact FlowId was used by ARN.

Selecting the TEXT mode will generate the same list of JSON objects but they will be fully expanded:

CCP Trouble Shooting

There is a very useful tool for testing the connectivity of a specific desktop call control (CCP) to your Amazon Connect instance. It provides useful information about the latency, resource, reachability and connectivity that are essential base lines for trouble shooting. Click here!

CCP LOGS

On the CCP you will find the little GEAR symbol and if you click on that you will be able to download the logs for this Agent Desktop.

You can open the logs with any text editor and the content often spells out the issue pronto quick!

(to be continued)

A Call Center for Cheap, Penny Pinching, Tightwads on a budget!

Posted on July 19, 2019 by DrVoIP

We Design, Deploy, Service and Customize Amazon Connect!

Since 2008 DrVoIP had been working in the support of VoIP based call centers from CISCO, Avaya and Mitel/ShoreTel solutions. Since 2017 we have focused exclusively on AWS services with a particular focus on ‘Amazon Connect” call centers. From Recording and Voice Mail solutions, through Workforce Management and Voice analytics we have provided custom software integrations on time, on budget and with the highest customer satisfaction scores. Our references are public, verifiable and serve as a guide to our abilities and commitment to excellence.

We are not here to run up your professional service bill. We are here to help you realize your call center vision an always work on a “fixed fee” basis.

We deploy “virtually” and “globally” so just click or call! – DrVoIP@DrVoIP.com

DrVoIP fixed cost deployment packages

Complete design, deployment and training base package includes:
- Amazon Connect instance setup in customer AWS Account, with usage billing direct from AWS;
  - Up to 10 inbound toll or DID numbers
    - DNIS direct to queue routing or 1 IVR DTMF Options Menu
  - Up to 5 Customer Service Queues
  - English Language support (option for Spanish, French)
  - Unlimited Agents
    - We configure 5 Agents for your use as a template and you configure all the others you may want
  - Up to 5 Routing Profiles
    - Routing profiles bind Agents to the CSQ they are assigned to work in.
  - Voice Mail with Email and SMS delivery
  - Queue Hold with options for “call back”, voice mail, transfer or continue to hold for Agent
  - Website Chat
    - a single queue connector that enables website visitor to “chat” with call center Agent
  - Dextr Dashboard integration
    - Dextr can provide email routing, text routing, real time and historical reporting
  - Fixed Price Deployment $2995
    - Larger call centers quickly quoted!
- OPTION PACKAGES
  - Multiple Language support
  - DIAL by Extension
    - Each agent has faux Extension number that can be used for direct call to agent
  - Dial by Name
    - Speech Recognition enables caller to speak a name (i.e. Tom) or function (i.e. Sales)
  - CRM Integration
    - Standard Publish Connector for Salesforce, Zendesk, Freshdesk, ZoHo, ServiceNow and others
      - Functionality defined by the CRM provider and author of the connector
  - CHAT BOT
    - FAQ, or Data acquisition before escalation to a Call Center Agent.

Free Trial of Dextr Dashboard is included!

To order an Initial Basic Configuration package and receive a detailed planing guide click here . Contact DrVoIP@DrVoIP.com or Better yet, Call 800-946-6127 ask LEX for the the Doctor!

Amazon Connect Call Center build strategy

We offer qualified companies a no cost “Proof of Concept “ (POC) Amazon Call Center Instance built in our portal for your use and testing with your agents able to log in and take phone calls on a number we provide. A POC can be set up within a few hours! From the POC, we design and deploy a solution that meets your requirements in your Amazon Connect portal. We make use of our discovery process and planning guides. We also build our solutions with our own Agent dashboard, named Dextr. Dextr provides the core feature set that all call center professionals expect including voice, text and email routing to the ‘next available agent’. We can also provide outbound “auto campaign dialers” to increase agent productivity for notifications, recorded announcements and appointment reminders.

Your TCO is further reduced, when compared to the cost of the software engineering or professional services required to obtain the same feature set as that available to Dextr subscribers. Dextr is a UCaaS solution that front ends Amazon Connect Instances with a custom agent dashboard and supervisor display. Any enterprise with an Amazon Connect instance can onboard themselves at https://Dextr.cloud. We deploy “virtually” and “globally” so just click or call!

DrVoIP Amazon Connect for the Business Manager

DrVoIP Amazon Connect for the Technical Manager

DrVoIP YouTube Channel – Complete Amazon Connect Configuration training!

Amazon Connect Email Routing using Dextr.Cloud

Posted on July 19, 2019 by DrVoIP

The Dextr Dashboard for Amazon Connect Agents has added email routing to its existing voice and SMS/MMS channels. Similar to a voice call, an incoming email message is routed to the next available in the queue assigned for email. Dextr will collect emails, provide auto responders. The email is “sticky” and the email conversation will stay with the first Agent to respond to the email until the conversation is ended. Similar to the Dextr SMS channel, if the original agent is not available to handle the follow on conversations, the entire conversation will be forwarded to the next available agent.

Setup is easy, in the Channels tab of a Dextr user with Administrator permissions, simply enter the appropriate email user, password, imap and smtp host address! Then configure the queue that should be the target of an inbound email along with the initial email auto responder and the end of conversation auto responder. Multiple emails can be established and can point to different customer service queues!

Email setup and queue selection!

Agents can manage email and voice calls depending on the permissions and queue assignments. Creating an email named CustomerCare@yourcompanyname.com can be routed to the customer service team. Email is an asynchronous yet powerful customer tools and many folks prefer it to waiting on hold for the next available agent! When an incoming email is routed to an available agent, they accept the mail exactly as they do a voice or sms call. Opening the ENGAGE EMAIL tab displays the content of the incoming email. As the email conversations ping pongs back and forth, the agent will see the entire email conversation in the ENGAGE portal.

The Agent will find the accepted email in the email client registered for that agent’s email box. The agent will then respond to the email and Dextr will assure that the recipient of the email sees that it is from the address of the origitanl email TO: filed. There is a button to END the conversation and when clicked, the final auto responder defined during the email channel setup, is sent to the author of the original incoming email. (Those familiar with ShoreTel ECC routing will be very comfortable with this email implementation which has the additional benefit of being “sticky”. If the agent who originally responded to the incoming email is unavailable, the entire email conversation is forwarded to the next available agent for follow up.

Dextr email routing is a bundled feature in your subscription and you should give it a try! Price is what you pay, value is what you receive. DrVoIP@DrVoiP.com

Enhance your ShoreTel ECC with Speech Recognition & Chat Bots!

Posted on July 2, 2019 by DrVoIP

Press 1 for English!

Two characteristics of telecom technology in the 21st century continue to not make sense to us. Why are we still using fax? How come we still “Press 1 for this and Press 2 for that”? I mean really, it is the 21st century after all. Let’s put fax aside for the moment and focus on the continued use of DTMF key presses in interactive voice response solutions like automated attendants and embedded applications, like bank account balance enquiries. You would think in this age of AI and Chatbots, you would no longer need to “Press 1 for English”. The application should be “smart” enough to to know what language you speaking!

ShoreTel ECC

The Shoretel ECC was originally designed and built by a team of engineers led by Avi Silber, former VP of Engineering for Tadiran, who left to form Easy Run a new brand of call center. Easy Run would ultimately enter into OEM deals with 3COM (remember the NBX?) and later ShoreTel. We had been working with the ShoreTel ECC since the Easy Run days and considered it one of the best small to medium call center solutions in the market. We still love it, but it has not had a major feature enhancement in years! In a call center world dominated by omni-channel solutions, this lack of new functionality, in our humble opinion, seems to be the end of the road for this product. (As an aside, Avi is now back at Tadiran and the company has acquired the Easy Run code).

Click2WebChat

For most of the last decade a primary revenue source for DrVoIP was the ongoing support of ShoreTel ECC contact centers. We think we have installed and maintain more ECC call centers than any other vendor on the planet. Clients would regularly make requests to enhance ECC. A common request for example, was to enable SMS or TEXT messages to be routed to the next available agent. We would code the solution and satisfy that client only to repeat that exercise the next time someone asked for that solution. For this reason, we determined to productize the solution and created Click2WebChat which brought Text, Video, Chat and Web sharing into the ShoreTel ECC arena.

ShoreTel Speech Recognition IVR?

There is no reason for ShoreTel ECC to be without speech recognition, natural language processing or chat bot technology. We now regularly front end ShoreTel ECC with AI bots that eliminate the need to “Press 1 for anything”. You can place a call into a ShoreTel ECC and have a much richer customer experience by offering a natural language interface. Imagine calling an ECC and having it answer “welcome to the customer support line, how can I route our call”. Speech Recognition is clearly a more effective solution that rattling off a long list of possible options that the caller can self navigate with a good memory for lists and a touch tone dial pad. We have been designing and building AI bots that work with ShoreTel ECC and make life a lot easier for both ends of the call center phone conversation. It is good for the customer and good for the Agent, shaving valuable minutes off each phone call to your ECC.

ShoreTel Chat Bots?

If you look at the content of phone calls to your contact center, you will notice that some large percentage of your customer requests are for the same reasons. Most call centers have already learned to create a Frequently Asked Questions (i.e. FAQ) database for use by the agents. The agents do not have to be subject matter experts to answer questions, they just need access to the FAQ database. Now, what would happen if that database was at the end of a Natural Language processing speech recognition bot that could handle that entire customer interaction without requiring a agent at all? It is not going to eliminate agents, but it will shift the work load such that agents are used to handle the percentage of your customer requests that are outside the FAQ database. This is where Chat Bots come in and do an excellent job 24X7, without vacations, holidays, sick days or breaks!

Long ago, we had a company Cobotyx that made “robot receptionists” or COBOTS. We learned that saying you were replacing low pay receptionists with a low cost machine, was not very smart. We borrowed an expression from the cybernetics thinker Dr. Norbert Wiener in his 1950 publication “The Human Use of Human Beings” and learned that we are not here to replace humans; we are here to free humans to do the things that only humans can do.

So, if you are considering updating your ShoreTel ECC to add any of this functionality, give us a call and learn just how easy and cost effective this technology can actually be. – DrVoIP@DrVoIP.com