Dialling into system, then dialing out?

General Help
1

I would like to know how I can achieve the two following things from FreePBX:

  1. Can I have someone from the outside call into the system to record my IVR messages, etc? I know that other systems do have this capability.

  2. Since I am on the road a lot, I would like to be able to call my phone system from my cell phone, then dial out of the system. I do not want my customers to have my cell number. They should only see the caller id from my office. Is this possible?

Thanks

2
  1. I don’t think this is possible without a bit of tweaking, or some manual assistance. Using the System Recordings module, you can make a recording from an extension, which can then be used in an IVR. You could, of course, make a three way call to bridge in an outside caller. However, I have a feeling that’s probably not what you are looking for. It might be helpful if you stated the circumstances under which you’d want to remotely record an IVR message - would it be a one-time thing or would you want to be able to do it frequently?

Depending on how familiar you are with Linux, you could perhaps use a technique similar to the one shown in How to make multiple extensions use a common voicemail box to make a voicemail recording double as an IVR recording. Or, maybe set up a voicemail box that’s not used for any other purpose, and use a cron job to check every minute or every five minutes to see if there’s a recording there and if so, copy it over the previous IVR recording, using sox to do an audio format conversion if necessary (IVR recordings are stored in /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom). Whatever you want to do is almost certainly POSSIBLE but you’re probably not going to be able to do it from within FreePBX (unless I am just brain-farting here and forgetting about some technique).

  1. This one’s easier. Set up an inbound route to recognize the caller ID of your cell phone. Send calls (either directly or via a special IVR menu) to the third-party Set CallerID module, and change the Caller ID there as you wish, then send the call from there to a DISA. Or, easier yet, skip the third party module and just send the call to a DISA and set the Caller ID field on the DISA setup screen (I mention the first method only in case you have some weird setup where you want to set the Caller ID at some point prior to entering the DISA). Note that your provider must allow you to set the Caller ID for this to work, however if they don’t allow that, then it’s highly unlikely they’d send your cell number.
3

Thanks for the reply.
The DISA suggestion is what I will go with for my second question. I did some testing on it and it does what I want.

For the first question, this would be a one time thing. Basically I would like someone to call in and do an IVR recording for me. Professionally done rather than my own recording. My voice just will not cut it. :slight_smile: However, they can always record a WAV file and just email it to me. That seems probably the easiest path.

Thanks for the suggestions.

4

Getting them to email the WAV file is definitely the way to go - it will sound much better if you do it that way. Upload it using the System Recordings module, and then use it in your IVR.

5

If you set up an temporary extension for your voice helper and let the person using the softphone with that extension, he or she can record the voice and you can save it for your IVR. You two have to work together to get it done. Your communication should be either using the IM or another phone number.