call prefix

[small_eyes]

Hi all,

currently we need to dial 9 + local number to make the call, is there anyway in mitel i can add the 9 in the system, so user only need to dail the local number to make the call? i dont want to set it for all the users, just one or two phones for guest.

[acejavelin]

Unfortunately, the 3300 has no way of doing this like the SX-200 (Direct to ARS) or the 5000 (House Phone to 8 ), in all honesty your best solution is to make a sign that says something like "Dial 9 for outside line" and put it by the phone(s) in question.

[matthew]

You might be able to hotline the phone/s to 9. This would prevent internal calls, though.  Or you could create trunk routes beginning with your local numbers, but these would be available to all users.

The easiest way would be to put a sticker on that phone that says "Dial 9 to place an external call". 

[small_eyes]

Thanks all for the help.

[ralph]

Uh oh.  I disagree.   

This depends on what you already have for a dialing plan in your system. 

In ARS under digits dialed put in 1 (North America) with 10 digits to follow.  Be sure to use a digit mod that does not delete the 1st digits.   You'll have to manage your digit conflicts with things like your FACs but technically there is no reason this can't be done.   If you should do it or not is another discussion.   I'm sure there will be some difficulties setting up for other countries but still it can be done this way.

Secondly,
Regarding the hotline thought by small_eyes.   You can't hotline directly to ARS  i.e. '9' but what you can do is set up an IP loopback trunk and hot line to it.

1- set up a loop back trunk on your system
2- set up an ARS route that is accessed with something like 889.   Absorb the 1st two digits with the digit mod.
3- hot line to 889

Now what happens is you go off hook and they system effectively dials the '9' for you.   But as small_eyes points out, you lose the ability to dial internal extensions.

Some where in the back of my mind I think I remember reading that the direct to ARS feature is coming in a future release (6 maybe?)

Ralph

[acejavelin]

Unfortunately, the 3300 has no way of doing this like the SX-200 (Direct to ARS) or the 5000 (House Phone to 8 ), in all honesty your best solution is to make a sign that says something like "Dial 9 for outside line" and put it by the phone(s) in question.

Perhaps I should have been more clear, the 3300 has no EASY or APPROVED way of doing this, it is however possible with various tom-foolery and excessive use of hardware... 

Is it worth doing for two public use phones? Depends, mostly on your boss I guess... I wouldn't do it and would explain to the customer it is just not feasible with this system. I would still recommend the sign telling people to dial a 9.

I remember hearing something about the "Direct to ARS" feature coming in a future version as well, I thought it was 5 (obviously not) but perhaps it will be in 6.

[ralph]

I missed the part about the 1 or 2 phones.  Setting up for a subset of phones isn't going to happen without hot dialing to a loopback trunk.

With careful planning you can easily set up ARS for system wide use.

This was a discussion I had with our internal staff (and somewhere on this forum too) and I asked the question as to why we need to set up systems for dial 9 access.   There isn't a technical reason not to but the consensus appears to have been something on the order of "That's the way it's done."

Ralph

Update:  I found one of the earlier discussions.  It can be found here. and here.