I know there isn’t direct support at present for Ring Groups, but does anyone know if using a PBX device will allow this functionality?
My client is with another provider (we sold it back in the day) has an IVR where they are given the option to reach Reception, Sales or Service. Each option would then call 3-4 phones in the appropriate group.
I have requested this functionality in the feature request function, but it isn’tt like that will appear tomorrow lol, and if we can work around it, all the better.
Thanks kindly for any thought and suggestionsa!!
Paul
VoIP.ms - Customer Portal: Call Hunting [Add Call hunting] then [Add Member]
in your IVR decide on the button user presses set Destination to Call Hunting
Hello @jucecomputers,
I am not sure to understand your question or request.
But Ring Groups have been working since “forever” with IVR. In your IVR simply select the ring group you want for any given option you type in. I implemented that behaviour in multiple businesses in the pat and it works really well.
Kind regards!
For arguements sake, the company I am working with has 22 phones. For the IVR or transfer function, they are 201-224 (skipping 211 I believe). For convenience sake, 201,2,3 are grouped under a ring group of 230. 206,7,8,9 are grouped under 231. 210,12 and 13 are grouped as 232. Finally 214,15,16 and 17 are grouped as extension 233.
So, from the IVR, I can say "To reach the recption group, press 230. To reach the sales team press 231. To reach the parts department, press 232. To reach a service team member, press 233…
Ideally, within the IVR (or even a call transfer), the customer can re-directed to whichever group dial, ring the 3,4,5 extensions will all ring and can be answered by the first available team member.
This was done with the Cloudli VoIP service previously.
I hope this makes it more clear. I have used the Ring Group for another customer, but it doesn’t seem to have the ability to create multiple groups that can be called upon from the IVR or as a call transfer from a user to the group.
Thanks kindly!
With the number of members on a team, wouldn’t that be potentially a long time to reach the final member of the calling group? And can you create multiple call hunting groups within an organization? I know the preferred option would be all extensions ringing in parallel so that after 5ish rings it would then go to voice mail, as opposed to going to the next extension for 5 more rings etc etc.
Thanks for the idea though!!
Hello @jucecomputers,
I see; if you want to transfer an active call, this is something else. Unfortunately, this is not possible to have a number for a Ring Group, nor a Call Hunting, which you can dial or transfer a call to with voip.ms. (A sad limitation since years.)
We achieved that using a local PBX and using voip.ms as a trunk. We could transfer a call to a Ring Group.
The nearest thing would be to use “Call Parking”. But I am not sure it will be a simple solution.
Another workaround worth trying would be to own multiple DID numbers. Each number would go directly to the desired ring group. Then you can transfer a call to that other phone number. But this is quite a hack, and it might use 2 “lines.” Calls between voip.ms numbers are free so you would not pay twice.
A local PBX gives you full contorl. Having other DID numbers as “reachable endpoints” to specific Ring Groups is a bit more expensive per month, but does the job with no additionnal hardware or virtual machines.
Kind regards!
Just to back up what @aleclerc said in post #3 – the IVR → ring group menu you originally described (press 1 for Reception, 2 for Sales, 3 for Service, each option ringing a group of phones) absolutely works on voip.ms today, and a ring group rings all its members in parallel, then drops to a voicemail box if nobody picks up. So your original Reception/Sales/Service menu with each option ringing several phones at once is very much doable.
For a fun way to show it, I’ve been building an (unofficial) MCP server for voip.ms – https://voipms-mcp.ecliptical.io – that lets an AI assistant like Claude drive your account in plain English. I gave it your exact scenario as one sentence:
Set up a phone menu on my main line 647-478-2641: callers press 1 for Reception, 2 for Sales, 3 for Service. Create three ring groups with those names – each one rings my demo SIP extension – then build an IVR that sends 1 to the Reception group, 2 to Sales, 3 to Service, using my existing greeting recording. Point my main line at the IVR when you’re done.
It read the account first, then built the whole thing itself:
- created the three ring groups (Reception, Sales, Service), each ringing the member extension(s) in parallel with a voicemail fallback if unanswered,
- created the IVR (press 1 → Reception, 2 → Sales, 3 → Service) using a greeting recording, with a timeout that falls back to voicemail,
- pointed the main DID at the IVR, and then re-read the DID to confirm the routing actually took.
In my testing each group rang all its members at once and rolled to voicemail after the ring time, which is the parallel-ring behavior you were after in your follow-up – not sequential hunting. To ring more phones per option you just add more members to that group; you can also give each group its own voicemail box.
One honest caveat, since you raised it later in the thread: this is the inbound IVR menu path. @aleclerc is right that dialing or transferring an active call straight to a ring group is a separate limitation – ring groups don’t have their own dialable number, so for warm transfers to a group you’re still looking at a PBX-as-trunk setup (or the multiple-DID hack). But for the “menu that routes callers into Reception/Sales/Service, each ringing multiple phones” you started with, no PBX needed.
(Not affiliated with or endorsed by VoIP.ms – just something I built on top of the API. Happy to share more if anyone’s curious.)
