Multiple Conference Calls

Is FreePBX able to conference in multiple calls at one time, in other words you
are on the phone with caller 1, you conference caller 2, thats pretty basic, but now I want to conference caller 3?

I know the “conference” function when you can have as many people as you want to call in, but the above is more about 1 person initiating the multiple conferences.

Thanks!

What you are describing initially is an ‘on phone’ 3-way conference feature, which is reliant on the phone firmware supporting that functionality and as you point out very rarely can handle more than a 3-way conference.

If you wanted to sort of emulate this “adhoc” conference functionality, you could simply transfer the active call into a meetme conference room - depending on your phone you could assign a speed dial button to do this. Then switch to the next active call and repeat.

On my phone (Cisco) I have a dedicated ‘Conference’ button and a ‘Transfer’ button. I’ve also created a meetme room on extension 8888 and assigned it to a speed-dial key (with BLF so I can see when folks are dialled into conference).

When I want to simply join 2 other calling parties in a 3-way conference I use the Conference button to ‘join’ the calls. On the other hand if I know there will be more than 3 parties joining the call, on the active call I just press the transfer button followed by my meetme speed dial button to move that caller into conference, swap to my other caller then repeat the exercise. Not too hard!

I have been trying to figure this out for some time. I remember having a functioning Confrn (Conference) button on my Cisco 7971 phones when I first connected them to my FreePBX (Elastix) installation.
The first configuration file I was using for the phones when the Confrn button worked was pulled from some website which I can’t seem to locate anymore.
The configuration file I’m using now is one I pieced together from using the 79xx page on voip-info.org and since I put that one together my Confrn button does not merge the two calls together.
In other words, I start the first call, press Confrn, start the second call, but when I press the Confrn button again absolutely nothing happens. The first call is on hold, the second call remains active and I don’t see anything happen on the asterisk console when I press the Confrn button to merge the calls.

I can only imagine there is supposed to be something in my configuration file for the phone that is preventing this from working. Can anyone offer any guidance or share a config file where this button functions correctly?
Thank you very much in advance!