What is Call Parking?

When a caller is placed on hold, their call remains on your phone on one of its line appearance keys so that when you are ready to resume the call, you can do so from just your phone. 

As an alternative to placing a call on hold, you can park a call. Parking a call moves the call to a virtual “parking spot” or park queue so that the call is no longer taking up a line appearance key on a particular phone. When a call is parked, it waits on hold within a park queue listening to your music on hold. A park queue is a call queue that has the sole purpose of keeping callers on hold until their call is retrieved from it. 

Static Parking VS Dynamic Parking

There are two different ways to park calls: Static Parking and Dynamic Parking. To learn more about how you can use either of these parking methods, review the module below:

Static Parking

With static parking, you can pick which park queue will receive the parked call. To do this, you would transfer the caller directly to a park queue. This can be the most ideal method if your company has given each park a specific purpose. 

✔ To use static parking to park a call, you can do one of the following:
    •  Press one of the Park buttons on a desk phone. 

    •  Transfer a call directly to a park by dialing a park's extension number during a transfer.

 

 

 

Dynamic Parking

In contrast to static parking, the phone system picks where the caller will be parked for you. The system would pick the most available park queue. 
For example, if there are not any callers parked in Park 1 (x701), the system would transfer the caller to Park 1.

✔ To use dynamic parking to park a call, dial *** while in an active call. 

After *** is dialed, you will hear an announcement that states which park the caller has been transferred to. Phones that have the park keys will see the LED light for the park change to red to show it is occupied. 

 

 

 

How Can I Retrieve a Parked Call?

Calls can be retrieved from a park from any phone and softphone on your account. 

If a desk phone has Call Park buttons (usually named Park 1, Park, and Park 3), the indicator light for a park button should have turned RED to indicate that the park is occupied. Press the park button with the red light to pick up the parked call.

If the phone you are using does not have park buttons, you can pick up a parked call by dialing the extension number of the park queue that is holding the call. This would be similar to placing a call to a coworker's extension number. 

By default, Park 1, Park 2, and Park 3 will have the extension numbers of 701, 702, and 703 respectively. To pick up a call from Park 1, you would dial 701, which will connect the parked call to your phone. 

Do I Have Park Queues Already?

By default, your account will have Park 1 (x701), Park 2 (x702), and Park 3 (x703). These park buttons are labelled Park 1, Park 2, and Park 3 by default, but their labels can be updated. 

More park queues can be added. This can be useful if you need to have different parks with different purposes, or if there are different groups of phones that should be monitoring separate parks. If a company has different departments, locations, or groups of users that handle very specific calls, the company could add additional park queues that are assigned as the park buttons for their phones. 

Why Use Call Parking Instead of Holding Calls?

Parking a call instead of placing it on hold allows other users to retrieve and resume the call on their own phones. 

Some great, niche uses for the call parking feature include:

• If a receptionist or operator is overwhelmed with calls, they could park calls instead of placing calls on hold so that they can accept and handle other calls. 
  Other users that are not busy can help handle the influx of calls by monitoring and using the Park keys of their desk phones to pick up parked calls. 
• If a call needs to be moved to a different device, the user could park the call, go to the other device, and retrieve the call. 
  This can be more useful than a transfer since the user would not need to rush to the other device before it stops ringing. 
• If a user is going to be unavailable for an indeterminate amount of time, their coworker could use a park queue as a waiting room where the caller can wait on hold until the user becomes available to retrieve the call. 
• Since handsets are more limited in the number of calls they can handle simultaneously, parking calls instead of keeping them on hold can be a great way to free up handsets so that they can answer other calls. 

What is Park Ringback?

Some companies may want a backup option in place for just in case a call is left parked for too long. A great preventative solution for this is Park Ringback. Park Ringback is a feature that allows the system to place a call to the user that parked a call to attempt to reconnect the parked call to that user. This ringback call is dispatched after a certain amount of time has passed. 

Submit a Request to Implement Park Ringback

Park Ringback will need to be set up for your account by our Technical Support team. Our Technical Support team would adjust how your park queues handle calls within your dial plan. 

To submit a request to have park ringback set up, an authorized POC (point of contact) would contact our technical support team by doing one of the following:

• Calling (469) 429-2500.
• Emailing support@spectrumvoip.com.
• Sending in a ticket using our support website:
  https://www.spectrumvoip.com/support/.

Within your request, it is recommended to include the following:

• If all or specific park queues should have this change. 
  

  Quick Tip: If only specific parks will use Park Ringback, provide a list of the extension numbers of the park queues that should be updated.

   
• The amount of time (in seconds) that the system should wait before dispatching ringback calls. 
  

  Quick Tip: Many companies go with 180 seconds so that ringback calls are not dispatched too early and frequently. 

   
• A good name and contact number of someone to contact for testing the change. 
• A preferred day and time to test the change and make any noticed changes.
• If you are not the POC for the account, written consent (i.e., a confirmation email) from a POC on your account will be needed.

Receiving a Park Ringback Call

Once the timeout for the parks is reached, a call will be placed to the user that parked the call. This call would play a prompt that will ask the caller to confirm they want to retrieve the parked call, or they can hang up. 

While the ringback call is ringing the user, they can use the following options on their phone to interact with the ringing ringback call:

• Answer – After picking up their handset or pressing Answer on their phone, there will be a message prompt that states “You have a parked call. Press 1 to retrieve the call.”
  • Pressing 1 will retrieve the call from park so that the user can begin speaking with the caller. 
  • Hanging up will keep the call parked. The ringback timer will reset.
• Forward – If the user presses the Forward button on their phone, they will be able to enter a number (10-digit or internal extension) to send the call to.
• Silence – The phone will continue to ring silently and will still be able to be picked up.
  • If the call goes unanswered, the ringback timer will reset.
• Reject – Pressing Reject on their phone will reject the call and keep the caller parked.
  • The ringback timer will reset.

What Ringtone Will Play?

The ringtone that plays for the ringback is dependent the type of caller that is put on park:

1. The default internal ringtone is two short midrange tones.
   • If an internal extension is put on park, then it will play the two short tones for the ringback.
2. The default external (3rd party calling in) ringtone is one long midrange tone. 
   • If an outside number is put on park, then it will play that one long midrange tone for the ringback.

Adjust the Wait Time for Park Ringback Calls

The amount of time the system will wait before placing a call for the park ringback is determined by the Ring Timeout setting found in the Answering Rules of a Park user. If you are an Office Manager user, you can 

1. Navigate to the Users page.
   
2. At the bottom of the Users page, deselect Hide System Users so that you can view and edit the park users. 
   
3. Using the Search Bar, type the name or extension number of the park queue you want to adjust.
   
4. Click the Edit icon next to the park user and select Answering Rules.
   
5. On the Answering Rules tab, use the Ring for dropdown to set how long (in seconds) the call should wait in the park before a ringback call is dispatched. 
   
   

   ✔ You should see a confirmation that the park will ring for that amount of time.
   

   Now the park queue will wait until this timeout is exceeded before a ringback call is sent to the user that parked the call. 

    
6. Repeat steps 3-5 for each park user that needs adjustment.