Telkom Line Hunting - How does it work?

[Saajid]

Hey fellow MyBB'ers

I've been assigned to sort out the PBX, telephone lines, hunting facilities, and advertised telephone numbers for one of our clients.

One thing I'm not fully understanding is how Telkom Line Hunting works. I've read the Telkom website, and understand the basics.

What I need to know is this: What happens if the primary/trigger number/line that you advertise to the world goes down. Can the hunting be re-routed somehow, but still allow people to call the client on the single advertised number?

Will getting an 086 number for the company help to solve this problem?

Also, here is a snippet from their Telkom bill. I've underlined the items related to Line Hunting, but don't understand what the numbers "2" and "3" in the "No" column actually mean. Does it mean dialling each number will hunt on 2 and 3 other numbers, respectively, if the number dialled is busy?

The way I understand, according to the client, is that their primary number sometimes goes down, so they have 2 trigger numbers for hunting, and their advertise both numbers to the world, and if one number goes down, their clients can try dialling the other number.

Does the above make sense, and is their a better way of managing this scenario? Will getting an 0860 number for the company help? Perhaps we can re-route the 0860 number to a different number, if the primary trigger number goes down.

Please assist. Any advice, suggesetions and related info will be much appreciated.

 

[Saajid]

<off-topic>

Just came across the following on the Telkom website:

MaxiCall 0861

The MaxiCall service allows you to utilise your resources more efficiently as the caller pays the full cost of the call to the MaxiCall 0861 number terminating on a Telkom Landline. The called party will be liable for call costs terminating on other service providers. The call is charged at a fixed rate, irrespective of the distance of the call (this excludes calls from cellular phones and other operators). This service is ideal for telemarketing since it discourages responses from people who are not serious about doing business with you.

Source: http://www.telkom.co.za/products_services/smartaccess/ServiceOption.html

I loll'ed!

</off-topic>

 

[Know_hope]

Hunting is easy to understand. Should the trigger number go down the incoming calls will still hunt between the lines in the group as usual, but should the incoming call ring on the trigger number, the call will not reach the PBX (unless there is a short on the trigger line - which will busy out the line and continue in the hunting sequence).

Hope this makes sense

 

[Saajid]

Hunting is easy to understand. Should the trigger number go down the incoming calls will still hunt between the lines in the group as usual, but should the incoming call ring on the trigger number, the call will not reach the PBX (unless there is a short on the trigger line - which will busy out the line and continue in the hunting sequence).

Hope this makes sense

Unfortunately not. What do you mean by: "should the incoming call ring on the trigger number"? The way I understand it, all calls will first try to ring on the trigger number. If it is unavailable (busy), then it will hunt for another line in the group.

So if the main line, the trigger line, goes down, doesn't this mean that the whole hunting facility goes down? Or is Telkom's systems more intelligent than this, and will reroute to another number in the group.

Also, any idea if an 0861/0860 number will help?

 

[Know_hope]

Ok. Analogue lines are "dumb", should they be disconnected in any way a call will still terminate on the line even though its not connected to anything.

You are misinformed about how the Hunting works. It uses a circular call distribution, between the lines in the hunt group including the trigger number, instead of a sequential distribution.

 

[Saajid]

Ok. Analogue lines are "dumb", should they be disconnected in any way a call will still terminate on the line even though its not connected to anything.

You are misinformed about how the Hunting works. It uses a circular call distribution, between the lines in the hunt group including the trigger number, instead of a sequential distribution.

Thanks for the replies dude. So are you saying that it doesn't really matter if the trigger number, or any of the other numbers go down? All the numbers are just thrown into a group, and one number is assigned a trigger number, and as long as you call the trigger number, hunting will take place, irrespective if the trigger number is currently busy, or down?

 

[Know_hope]

Correct

 

[Saajid]

Correct

Awesome. Now coming back to the client's Telkom bill. From what I understand, they have 2 trigger numbers - 725 and 564. Why would it be necessary to have 2 trigger numbers? Unless I am reading/understanding it incorrectly.

 

[Know_hope]

I can't view the link for the bill?

 

[Deadmanza]

Necro'ing this thread as I am needing to find out from Telkom which numbers are in 1 of our clients hunting groups.

Any idea who I would contact at Telkom?

 

[Saajid]

Necro'ing this thread as I am needing to find out from Telkom which numbers are in 1 of our clients hunting groups.

Any idea who I would contact at Telkom?

Phone Telkom on 10210 or 10217. They should be able to tell you over the phone, after they've verified your identity. Have all the details ready before phoning them, or ask your client to phone them, and then hand the phone to you after they've verified.