Question
What is a Ring Group and what can I do with it?
Applies To
Answer
A Ring Group is a feature that allows you to have multiple
phones ring when one extension or number is dialed. It’s a great way for a
business to share the distribution of incoming calls among employees. It is
often used to efficiently distribute calls to specific departments such as
Sales, Customer Support and Accounting.
Ring groups allow your employees to be more productive and
help decrease customer hold time. If all of the users assigned to a ring group
are unavailable, you have forwarding options such as routing the call to the
ring group’s voicemail box or transferring the call to another extension.
The Ring Group feature is provided free of charge with your
8x8 Work service.
Some examples of how a business can use ring groups:
Small
business with 4 employees – Set up a ring group to include all
four employees. When a call comes in, you could have all four extensions
ring simultaneously so whoever picks up first takes the call. Or set up
the ring group so the phones ring in a specific order to better distribute
the workload.
Larger
business – Set up a Ring Group for your sales team. When a call
comes into your sales number, you can set it up to ring the sales reps in
a certain order so they each get a turn to answer incoming calls. Or set
it up so all the phones in the group ring simultaneously so whoever answer
the phone fastest gets the sale!
Multiple
Departments – If you have multiple departments in your company,
use ring groups to simplify transferring calls. Set up ring groups for
Sales, Technical Support, Shipping, etc. Then you can either set up your
Auto Attendant to route calls to these ring groups (e.g., "Press 1
for Sales," "Press 2 for Technical Support," etc.) or you
can have the receptionist transfer live calls to the appropriate ring
group instead of calling multiple extensions to find a live person to take
the call.
Each Ring Group can have any type of number assigned to it.
The number can be a virtual number, toll-free number,
the main company number, or any other number in your system. It can
also be answered by the auto attendant or by another extension.
Enterprise-class services like Ring Groups can help take
your business to the next level by improving employee efficiency and delivering
better customer service.
Selecting the Right Ring Pattern
When a call comes into a ring group, you can choose how
that call will be distributed. You can select from three-ring patterns to
configure your Ring Group.
Cyclic:
Also known as rollover. A Cyclic pattern allows an equal distribution of
calls, making sure all extensions in the Ring Group assist in answering
the calls. You can set the number of times the call cycles through the
extensions before sending it to voicemail.
Example: For
a 3-line Ring Group, the first call rings ext. 101 (no answer), then ext.
102 (answered). Second call rings ext. 103 (no answer), then ext. 101
(answered).
Cyclic
Repetitive: A Cyclic Repetitive pattern allows calls to be distributed
among all extensions in the group in the order that the extensions are
entered. You can set the number of times the call cycles through the
extensions before sending it to voicemail.
Example: For
a 3-line Ring Group, the first call rings ext. 101 (no answer), then ext.
102 (answered). Second call rings ext. 101 (answered). Third call rings
ext. 101 (no answer), then ext. 102 (no answer), then ext. 103
(answered).
Simultaneous
Ring: The Simultaneous Ring pattern rings all extensions at the same
time when a call is received. The first extension to pick up the phone
will answer the call.