Scheduling and retries

An outbound agent calls contacts only inside the hours you allow, and retries contacts it couldn’t reach until they answer or run out of attempts. These settings decide how fast your list is worked through, how often each person is called, and when the agent stops. You’ll find them in the agent’s Availability settings. Open the agent, click Edit, and select the Availability node on the workflow canvas.

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Calling hours

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Days and time slots

Choose the days the agent can call and the hours for each day. The default is Monday to Friday, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm.

• Click a day’s letter to turn it on or off.
• When every day has the same hours, one start and end time is shown. Expand it to set hours per day.
• Click Add time slot to add a second window in the same day, for example 9:00–12:00 and 14:00–18:00. Slots in a day can’t overlap.
• Click Copy time slots to all days on a day’s first slot to apply that day’s slots to every other day. This overwrites the other days.

Times are set in 15-minute steps.

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Time zones

Time zone sets the zone your calling hours are measured in. It defaults to your browser’s time zone. Turn on Use Contact’s Time Zone to call each contact during their own local hours instead. Callers estimates each contact’s time zone from their phone number:

• US and Canada: from the area code.
• Other countries: from the country.
• Set through the API: the timezone you sent wins. See Add contacts.

When this option is on, the time zone selector becomes Fallback Time Zone. It’s used for contacts whose time zone can’t be worked out.

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Calling right after a pre-call chat

If the agent uses a pre-call chat, the Agreed to receive a voice call card has an Allow calling outside working hours option. When it’s on and the contact agrees to a call over text, the call is placed immediately, even outside your calling hours. It’s off by default.

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Inbound agents

Inbound agents have no schedule. They answer calls at any time, and the Availability node shows Receive calls full time. Text agents have their own sending hours; see Text agent settings.

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Retries

When a call doesn’t reach the contact, the contact goes to Pending Retry and is dialed again later. These outcomes cause a retry:

• No answer, busy, or a failed call.
• Voicemail.
• A call with no real conversation, such as a silent pickup or an immediate hang-up. See Statuses and outcomes.

Any real conversation produces a final outcome (for example Interested, Not interested, or Wrong number), and the contact isn’t called again. The exception is Call later, described below.

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Retry settings

When a contact has several phone numbers, the attempt limit is multiplied by the number of valid numbers. Five attempts and two numbers allow up to ten calls. When a contact uses up all its attempts without a conversation, its status becomes Unreached and it’s no longer dialed.

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Different attempts per day

By default, the same daily maximum applies every day. To call more on the first day and less afterwards, click Split Attempts per Day. The total is spread across Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3 – All Following Days. You can then edit each row:

• Pick a range of days (Day 1 to Day 7) and set its Dial Attempts.
• Click Add Day to add a row.
• The last row must end with All Following Days.

For example, 3 calls on day 1, 2 on day 2, and 1 a day after that works well for fresh inbound leads: you reach most people quickly without calling the rest too often.

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Call later requests

When a contact says they’re busy or asks you to call back, the call is classified as Call later. What happens next depends on Continue Dialing Attempts after “Call Later”, under the agent’s Technical Settings:

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Concurrency

Concurrency limits how many calls the agent runs at the same time. Your account also has an overall outbound limit shared by all agents. If several agents run at once, the account limit can hold calls back even when each agent is under its own limit. Agencies set these limits per subaccount; see Managing subaccounts.

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When the agent stops dialing

An outbound agent keeps running while it has eligible contacts. A contact is eligible when:

• its status is New or Pending Retry (or Call later, if dialing continues after Call Later),
• it has attempts left, and
• the minimum wait time has passed since its last call.

When no contacts are eligible, the agent is marked complete and you get a notification that it has no pending contacts. Add new contacts and it starts dialing again on its own. You also get a notification when fewer than 20% of contacts are still pending. See Notifications.

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Troubleshooting

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