To ensure a smooth experience with Talkdesk, you can find below a list of requirements and best practices that you need to keep in mind when setting up your hardware, software, and network.

✔️ Getting Started: Checklist

📬 Your Talkdesk invitation

💻  Supported Operating Environments 

⏻ Computer Power Configuration

🎧  Headsets

🌐  Internet

✔️ Getting Started: Checklist

1. Acknowledge and accept the Talkdesk invitation.
2. Review the operating environments that the agents will use.
3. Make sure everyone is using a wired headset with the best configuration.
4. Connect via Ethernet and read the recommendations below for VPN/VDI usage.
5. Where will the Agents work? Depending on whether it's home or the office:
   • Make the necessary changes in the Firewall and QoS;
   • Follow our alternatives to Wi-Fi when Working from Home.
6. Test your connectivity using our Network Test Tool.

Please continue reading for more details.

📬 Your Talkdesk invitation

Your account administrator may have set up a user account for you, but before using Talkdesk you need to accept the invitation that has arrived in your inbox. For further details, please refer to this article.
This is not applicable to accounts that have exclusive SSO login methods, as these accounts are activated upon the first login.

If you haven’t received your invitation, please ask your account administrator to follow these instructions:

• Make sure the Agent is created under your account.
• Confirm that the Agent is set as active.
• Make sure the e-mail registered on the Agent’s profile is correct.
• Allow the following domains (see full list here): 
  • *talkdesk.com
  • *outbound-mail.sendgrid.net
  • *sendgrid.net
    
    

💻  Supported Operating Environments 

When setting up the operating environment to work with Talkdesk, please review these requirements:

• Operating System (OS):
  • Talkdesk CX Cloud (Agent Workspace):  Windows 10 / Windows 11 / macOS* 10.14+.
  • Talkdesk Classic: Windows 10 / macOS 10.14+ / Linux 64bit (Debian 9 or Red Hat 8 based distros) / Chrome OS.

*Note: We recommend waiting for at least one week after the release of a new major OS version before performing the update. This approach helps minimize the risk of unexpected issues with the new OS version.

• RAM: Recommended minimum 8 GB* of RAM.
• CPU: Intel Core i5 4440 or better/ AMD Ryzen 5 1600 or better.
• Browsers: 
  • Google Chrome, updated to the latest version*. See here how to configure it and here how to set it as the default browser. Note that Google is phasing out third-party cookies, see product notice here.
  • Microsoft Edge, updated to the latest version. See here how to configure it.

• Security: If you use any software or Proxy that can block applications, please include Workspace in the allowlist.
  

*Notes: The suggested RAM may not ensure optimal performance for users running multiple tasks or resource-intensive applications.

You can access Talkdesk CX Cloud through the Web or Desktop app. The following table summarizes the supported options per device type. 

⏻ Computer Power Configuration

Adequate power configuration can prevent situations in which, in Workspace, and Conversations, the Agent status is inadvertently changed to “offline”, or the call is dropped. This happens because the app notifies Talkdesk servers in regular 4-minute intervals, sending what’s referred to as a “Heartbeat”, indicating the current agent status, and restoring the “Time to Live”. Each agent has a time interval during which a set of validations are performed to confirm they remain active on the app. This time interval is known as “Time to Live”. If, after 4 consecutive 4-minute cycles, no positive feedback is sent to Talkdesk servers (namely, no heartbeat is sent), the agent status should change to “Offline”.  To learn more about this behavior in the Conversations app, please refer to Conversations: Status Update to “Offline” - Heartbeat.

This is often caused by the computer or the hard drive going into sleep mode, or the computer being disconnected from the internet. Make sure to follow these guidelines to ensure the machine’s optimal power configuration.

Note: Depending on the version of the operating system that your machine is running, the location and configuration of the options below described may be different.

• Windows: 
• Click on the battery/power icon in the taskbar and select More Power Options. In the Control Panel window that opens, select Change Plan Settings for your current power plan. In the next window, select Change Advanced Power Settings and choose the sleep and display settings that you want your computer to use.
  

• Mac:
  • Choose the Apple menu > System Preferences and then click Energy Saver. Do any of the following: set the amount of time your computer or display should wait before going to sleep. Drag the “Computer sleep” and “Display sleep” sliders or the “Turn display off after” slider. 
    
    

🎧  Headsets

When choosing headsets to handle calls with Talkdesk, please consider the following:

• We recommend using a wired headset with a 3.5 mm jack (analog) port;
• You can use a USB headset, but this option will consume resources from your computer;
• We also do not recommend Bluetooth/Wireless headsets for professional long-term usage:
  • The battery level is a factor in these devices (the lower the battery, the lower the range);
  • Being a wireless device, it suffers from interference from other wireless devices in the area;
  • Bad reception or increased latency is common, which could falsely point to a network issue.
• If you use Windows OS, follow the recommended settings for Workspace.

📎  Learn more about the headsets that we recommend here.

• Regarding the network requirements for Screen Recordings, the minimum is 500Kbps on top of the 100Kbps for Audio Calls (not considering other apps running on the Desktop, and/or bigger screen resolutions).

🌐  Internet

Bandwidth

Make sure that enough bandwidth is reserved to work with Talkdesk:

• A good rule of thumb is a 1Mbps symmetrical connection per device;
• Avoid having other people using/sharing your bandwidth while you are on a call, especially if it involves activities that consume a considerable amount of bandwidth, such as:
  • Streaming multimedia content (4K/HD/Full HD Movies);
  • Online gaming;
  • Downloading large content (such as torrents).
• Disable recordings on any DVR / Set-top boxes, as these can consume bandwidth.
• Regarding the network requirements for Screen Recordings, the bandwidth required is proportional to the screen resolution. If you are using big resolutions across multiple monitors and even 4k, the minimum requirements should increase to around 2Mbps.

Connection best practices

Make sure to follow these guidelines regarding the type of connection:

• Ethernet is the preferred connection type. Use a Cat 5E cable, or above.
• Set the following DNS servers (if possible):
  • Primary DNS: 8.8.8.8
  • Secondary DNS: 1.1.1.1
• Avoid using VPN (Virtual Private Network). If you do need to use a VPN, split tunneling must be configured in order to ensure that traffic from  Workspace is routed directly to the internet instead of through the VPN.

• Where possible, avoid running Talkdesk Workspace directly within VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure) or Remote environments.

Although practical from a systems' administration perspective, virtual/remote desktop environments are still a suboptimal solution when it comes to real-time voice, and add complexity and latency to the real-time voice needs within the Talkdesk CX Cloud product.

Talkdesk recommends the following options to utilize the Agent Workspace alongside a VDI environment. When used in the following configurations, Talkdesk will continue to support our customers in maintaining the high-quality voice calls they come to expect from the Talkdesk solution. At all times, customers should observe Talkdesk recommendations to ensure their systems are set up for optimal voice performance.

• Local Desktop
• Forward to External SIP Device

These options are explained in more detail in the article Talkdesk VDI Support.

Successful usage of Talkdesk's Workspace in a VDI environment may require tuning and additional testing to be carried out by the customer's system administrator(s) / VDI provider(s).

Office and Home

If you and your agents are:

• Working from the Office: Make sure to implement the required Firewall and QoS configurations. 
• Working from Home: If you can't use Ethernet, please follow our Alternatives to Wi-Fi.

Using Wi-Fi as a Temporary Solution

As you can see in the above image, Wi-Fi is prone to packet loss, latency variation, and jitter.

If you are waiting for an Ethernet or PLC (power line) adaptor and need to use Wi-Fi temporarily, please follow these guidelines:

• Use the latest standards (> Wi-Fi 5 IEEE 802.11ac) with MU-MIMO support and the 5 GHz band, as opposed to the 2.4 GHz. This will reduce the range but decrease the probability of environmental interference;
• Connect as few devices as possible to the same AP, to better concentrate and serve your own;
• Upgrade to a mesh AP network. It allows reachability from several points in the home and repeats the traffic between the cells. This way, the packets are not lost if a specific area is affected.

📎  Learn more about why we recommend Ethernet here.

🎛️  Final Step: Testing your Network Connection

Finally, you can test the quality of your network connection by using the Talkdesk Network Test Tool.

If you face any call quality issues or the test results are not as expected, you can reach out to our support team, by submitting a request here.

Talkdesk CX cloud supports Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge. Making sure the browser is up-to-date, and properly configured, is key to an optimal Talkdesk use. Both browsers allow users to benefit from the best experience and call quality due to mature WebRTC support.

If you are using Google Chrome, ensure you have the latest version and that it is configured as the default browser. If you are using Microsoft Edge, check the latest version.

• Setting up Google Chrome
  • Granting Access to Third-party Cookies
• Setting up Microsoft Edge
• Removing Extensions

Setting up Google Chrome

When you first log in to Talkdesk Workspace for Web in Google Chrome, you must give permission to the microphone.

If you don’t, you will see a red “X” over a microphone icon in the URL bar. This means Talkdesk doesn't have permission to access your microphone. If you click on this icon, you should see a pop-up window:

1. Select “Always allow yourcompanyname.mytalkdesk.com to access your microphone”, and click Done. 
2. You must then refresh your browser by clicking Reload. In some cases, you may also need to log out of Talkdesk, close the browser (all windows), and then reopen it.

You will also be prompted with other messages to set your browser permissions, such as permission to receive desktop notifications.

Granting Access to Third-party Cookies

If you need to grant access to third-party cookies in Google Chrome, this can be achieved in one of two ways: via More > Settings (detailed instructions here), or by going to the URL bar, clicking the "Third-party cookies blocked" (eye) icon [1], and enabling "Third-party cookies" [2].

Note: Google Chrome will be phasing out the use of third-party cookies in order to protect privacy and reduce cross-site and cross-app tracking. For more information, please refer to our Announcement. 

Setting up Microsoft Edge

When accessing Microsoft Edge for the first time, you will be asked to enable permissions for the microphone, notifications, pop-ups, and redirects:

Additionally, you might receive a message alerting “Ringtone is muted”. Check the following Knowledge Base article to learn how to unmute the ringtone permanently.

Removing Extensions

Some browser extensions can block Talkdesk functionalities, including the audio, and cause the interface to behave unexpectedly. Here is a list of extensions you should avoid when using Talkdesk:

• AdBlock Plus.
• AdBlock.
• HTTPS Everywhere.
• ScriptSafe.
• Flashblock.
• Disconnect.
• DoNotTrackMe.
• Ghostery.
• WebRTC Network Limiter.

In case you have these extensions installed, please follow these instructions to remove them from the browser:

1. In Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge, click the “More Options” button in the top-right corner.
2. Select Extensions, Manage Extensions.
3. On the extension you want to remove, click “Remove”.
4. A notice to remove the extension will appear. Click “Remove”.

Learn how you can customize and leverage Talkdesk for your business, in the shortest time possible, by focusing on these key functionalities.

For in-depth training, explore the resources in Talkdesk Academy.

0: Review Set up Best Practices and Recommendations

To ensure a smooth experience with Talkdesk, you can find here a list of requirements and best practices that you need to keep in mind when setting up your hardware, software, and network. When configuring your firewall, make sure to review the necessary domains, IP addresses, and ports provided here.

1: Purchase and Set up Phone Numbers

To set up a new phone number in Talkdesk, navigate to Admin > Numbers and select Buy Number. Ring groups (also known as Queues) will be used later to route calls to agents.

2: Add New Users

From Admin > Users, add new users and assign them a role, such as other Administrators. You can apply a default role, or build different roles by going to Admin > Roles and Permissions.

3: Make a Test Call with Conversations

Go to the app Conversations app and try it out by making a call.

4: Customize Incoming and Outcoming Flows

From Admin > Studio, you can build out multiple conversational flows with different triggers and outputs. 

Learn more about Studio: 

• Getting Started with Studio
• Studio Components - Overview

5: Add New Contacts

In the Contacts app, you can add and find all your business and internal contacts.

6: Try out the Voicemails app

Take a peek at the Voicemails app, where you can access and handle all voicemails in one location. 

7: Analyze interactions

Check out the Activities app where you’ll be able to analyze voice and digital interactions.

8: Monitor performance

With Talkdesk Live real-time monitoring, you can turn data into actionable insights.

9: Analyze historical data

Leverage the reports and dashboards in Talkdesk Explore to view performance metrics and insights.

10: Monitor your team’s behavior

Rely on Talkdesk Guardian to detect and mitigate security risks. 

Talkdesk requires our customers to configure their firewalls and network security devices to allow access to a prescribed set of domains, IP addresses, and ports. This is to ensure Talkdesk is able to operate effectively for your users.

Any updates to the set of required firewall domains will be reflected in this article and:

• Communicated through release notes for Administrators;
• Alerted via the Weekly Digest which summarizes the latest release notes and notices to subscribed Administrators.

The following domains must be excluded from inspection/policing on ports 80 and 443 where applicable.

• Global Domains
• United States (US) Regional Cloud Domains
• Europe (EU) Regional Cloud Domains
• Canada (CA) Regional Cloud Domains
• Australia (AP) Regional Cloud Domains

Latest Additions: 

• Global: *.lrkt-in.com; cdn.lrkt-in.com; r.lrkt-in.com
• USA: styx.us-east-1.talkdeskapp.com ; live-api.talkdeskapp.com ; live-api.us-east-1.talkdeskapp.com ; live-api.us-east-2.talkdeskapp.com ;
• EU: styx.eu-central-1.meza.talkdeskapp.eu ; live-api.meza.talkdeskapp.eu ; live-api.eu-central-1.meza.talkdeskapp.eu ; live-api.eu-west-1.meza.talkdeskapp.eu ; 
• CA: styx.ca-central-1.meza.talkdeskappca.com ; live-api.meza.talkdeskappca.com ; live-api.ca-central-1.meza.talkdeskappca.com  ;
• AP: styx.ap-southeast-2meza.talkdeskapp.au ; live-api.meza.talkdeskapp.au ; live-api.ap-southeast-2meza.talkdeskapp.au ; 

Notes: 

• The asterisk (*) means that the listed domain includes all subdomains.
• The listed domains are hosted on Amazon Web Services and Cloudflare. For more information about their current public IP ranges, please review the documentation from Amazon and Cloudflare. Please note that Amazon/Cloudflare changes these ranges often, and services could originate from any address in these ranges.
• Please review this article to understand the IPs and ports in more detail and view information about enabling Quality of Service (QoS).

Related Articles:

• Talkdesk IPs Allowlist
• Quality of Service (QoS) & Ports
• Setting up Talkdesk: Requirements and Best Practices.

Global Domains

United States (US) Regional Cloud Domains

Europe (EU) Regional Cloud Domains

Canada (CA) Regional Cloud Domains

Australia (AP) Regional Cloud Domains

To ensure resilient and redundant voice communications, your firewall must allow outgoing traffic from the Conversations App to the Talkdesk Global Communications Network and allow return traffic in response to the Conversations App egress connectivity. Connections are always outbound from Talkdesk voice applications. Once a connection is established, data will be bi-directional. Note: Talkdesk will never initiate a connection from the Talkdesk Cloud or Talkdesk Global Communications Network to a Talkdesk client. 

1 - When a call is initiated, either an inbound call or an outbound call, the Talkdesk client sends a connection request to the Talkdesk Global Communications Network to establish a WebRTC connection.

2 - When the connection is established, bi-directional communications are allowed between the two voice endpoints, the Talkdesk user and the caller.

IP ranges and protocols are used to establish Web Real Time Communication (WebRTC) between the Conversations App, Talkdesk’s Global Communication Network WebRTC Gateway, and the Regional Cloud Platform. Therefore, must be reachable. If you want to prioritize voice traffic, and your router supports Quality of Service (QoS), you can set up rules using the media IP ranges below.

Please review these guidelines:

• If your router includes SIP Application Level Gateway (ALG) or Stateful Packet Inspection (SPI), disable both these functions.
• Avoid the use of a VPN, as encapsulating VoIP traffic within an IPSec tunnel could affect audio quality. If you do need to use a VPN, you can exclude the media traffic from the IPSec tunnel by applying split-tunneling. 
• It is important that the traffic from the Conversations App goes directly to the internet at the agent's physical location wherever possible to assure the lowest latency to our WebRTC Gateways and the highest call quality.

Media IP Ranges

Global Low-Latency

QoS Traffic Shaping

Additional Resources

Media IP Ranges

*For global geographical redundancy, Talkdesk utilizes multiple WebRTC Gateways and Locations.

• TCP: ports 3478, 80, and 443. Note: All port 80 traffic is redirected to HTTPS port 443.
• UDP: ports 3478 and 10000 – 60000, used for media: the client will select any available port from the ephemeral range.
• TCP/UDP: port 3478 is used for Talkdesk Network Test tool and Screen recording.

Global Low-Latency

Our service uses Global Low-Latency (GLL) routing to assign the closest WebRTC Gateway Location to the Agent with the lowest latency. GLL region selection reduces audio latency in call scenarios where two or more parties are connected in a region.

Thanks to GLL, conference audio latency will be reduced in cases where two or more parties are physically close to one another, but far from the Talkdesk Regional Cloud. For example, for customers deployed on Talkdesk’s US Regional Cloud, a call from Sydney to Sydney will see the greatest benefit from Global Low-Latency as the difference between a locally routed media path and a media path that routes through the United States is the greatest. 

Quality of Service: QoS Traffic Shaping

Voice traffic on an organization’s local area network is similar to data traffic, in the sense that it is transmitted as packets over different devices. The main difference between data and voice traffic is that data traffic has the ability to resend information if it initially gets lost in transit.

Voice traffic, on the other hand, cannot resend information because the packets must be received in order, as a continuous stream, for the information to make sense. As such, the way voice packets are treated in your network will have a significant effect on your call quality.

We recommend configuring your network in a way that voice traffic has higher priority than data traffic, and setting up QoS rules based on the Media IP addresses listed above.

This will ensure that your calls have optimal audio quality, without having a noticeable effect on your data traffic.

• Please reach out to your organization’s network / IT team to determine the best way to set up traffic prioritization.
• If you do not have an IT team available, we suggest reaching out to your internet provider to check if prioritization can be configured on your network.

Additionally, Talkdesk enables DSCP (Differentiated Services Code Point) by default, with Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Conversations App, tagging WebRTC media packets, which enables differentiated handling on a LAN, so that real-time media can be prioritized above other network traffic. These will be tagged as EF (101110): Expedited Forwarding (46).

Related Articles:

• Implementing QoS on Windows Environments
• Firewall Configurations
• Talkdesk IPs Allowlist
• Setting up Talkdesk: Requirements and Best Practices

Talkdesk requires customers to configure their firewalls and network security devices to allow access to a prescribed set of domains, IP addresses, and ports. This is to ensure that Talkdesk is able to operate effectively for your users.

This article focuses on the required external IPs. Your firewall or network security device needs to allow incoming traffic from these IP addresses to allow, for example, SSO in Talkdesk with Salesforce credentials. 

Products with specific IP requirements:

• Conversations
• Talkdesk Digital Engagement (Email Channel)
• Talkdesk Phone (SIP Devices)

Please review also these related articles:

• Firewall Configurations
• Quality of Service & Ports
• Restricting User Logins to Defined IP Ranges

To log in to Talkdesk for the first time, open the welcome email sent to you ("Invitation Instructions”) and click on the link that says Accept Invitation:

After you click the link, you will be asked to choose a password:

Once you confirm your password, you can log in for the first time.

The Account name is included in the email invitation, mentioned above, and can also be identified by looking at the address bar in the browser: it's the name appearing before “talkdeskid.com/login” and “.mytalkdesk.com”.

For example: in the address mycompany123.mytalkdesk.com, the Account name is “mycompany123”.

Note: If you didn't receive an invitation, review the steps outlined in this article.

In this porting guide, you can find information about the basic workflows for porting your phone numbers.

The guide covers the following topics: 

Porting Coverage

• In which countries do we offer porting?
• How much does it cost to port my existing numbers to Talkdesk?
• How long does it take to port my existing phone numbers?

Understanding Number Porting

• How to start your porting process
• Providing accurate porting information
• Ensuring that the request is not rejected
• Don't disconnect services with your current carrier
• Porting date
• Order cancellation requests

Porting Rejection

• Why was my port request rejected?

Number Port Out

• Can I take my numbers with me if I decide to leave Talkdesk?

Porting Coverage

In which countries do we offer porting?

Talkdesk is working on reviewing and extending its coverage at a fast pace. In case you have any doubts about the portability of your phone number, please contact our Support team.

How much does it cost to port my existing numbers to Talkdesk?

You can port your existing phone numbers to Talkdesk, free of charge for the standard porting process. We do require, however, that you have an active account with Talkdesk.

How long does it take to port my existing phone numbers?

The time it takes to port existing phone numbers may vary depending on the location, the country's regulations, and the parties involved, such as the losing and the receiving carriers.

US porting process takes between 2 to 4 weeks after documentation approval. However, please note that there have been some instances of the porting process being completed in 48 hours. The amount of time varies depending on the carriers involved. Any rejection by the carriers due to incorrectly submitted information can cause delays.

In US porting requests, we pre-add your phone numbers to your Talkdesk account a few days after the request is submitted. We do this so that you can configure your numbers in preparation for the actual porting date.

For other countries, we pre-add your phone numbers to your Talkdesk account when we receive a preliminary porting date from our telecom provider. This should still give you enough time to configure your numbers.

To minimize the time it takes to port a phone number, we suggest you proactively contact your carrier first to inform them of your intention to port and request a Customer Service Record (CSR) before submitting your porting forms. The details need to match 100%, otherwise, the porting request will be rejected by your current carrier. 

Understanding Number Porting

How to start your porting process

If you wish to port numbers to Talkdesk, please submit your request here: https://support.talkdesk.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

Please let us know the country and the number(s) you wish to port in, together with the Talkdesk account name to which the numbers will be ported. We will get back to you with all the information you need to send us to get your porting request started. That information can vary according to the country and phone number type.

The Talkdesk support team will then share the Letter of Authorization (LOA) with you as well as the list of documents required. Talkdesk will submit the porting request as soon as you provide all the necessary documentation, and the signed and dated LOA.

See the full Talkdesk porting workflow below: 

Providing accurate porting information

The Letter of Authorization (LOA) is an industry-standard document used by carriers or resellers to authorize the transfer of a phone number. It contains all the relevant information about phone numbers and their owner or authorized signatories, with the respective signature authorizing the porting. The LOA may be specific to the country or region, as well as its language and specificities.

Regulations in some countries require a local business address and specific documentation to use a phone number. To know each country’s specific requirements please contact the Talkdesk Support team.

This documentation will be reviewed by both the receiving and the losing carrier, and if it is not compliant with the national compliance requirements, the porting request will be rejected. Hence, its utmost importance that all the documents are legible, recent, and coherent to the LOA and compliance regulations. 

Ensuring that the request is not rejected

Please note that if the documents are not compliant with the following guidelines, the porting request may be rejected, causing significant delays. Although we are strongly committed to providing you with a smooth porting process, Talkdesk cannot be deemed responsible for any incorrect submissions and delays resulting from failure to comply with the guidelines.

• Submit the document in PDF format.
• Submit it in the correct orientation (for instance, if the pages are upside down, the document will not be accepted).
• All data must match exactly and be consistent with the record in the existing carrier.
• The name and address on both the LOA and the proof of ownership must match.
• The first/last name on the LOA (Letter of Authorization) must match the signature.
• The telephone numbers you wish to port must be clearly indicated, preferably using the E.164 international standard (example: +16175551212).
• If asked for a Responsible Organization (RespOrg) by the losing provider, please reach out to us so that we can provide it to you.
• The LOA and the proof of ownership documents must not be older than 30 days.

If your port request is rejected, check what could be the reason from the list of most common reasons.

Don't disconnect services with your current carrier

If you want to port your numbers to Talkdesk, please do not disconnect or inactivate them, since only active numbers can be ported. You may also ensure that no freezes or suspensions exist that would prevent porting activity with the current carrier.

Porting date

It is not possible to choose a porting date or a porting window. Porting dates are agreed upon between the receiving and the losing carriers and cannot, unfortunately, be customized. As well as porting windows, which are usually standard according to the country.

During the porting window, the losing carrier will release the number(s) and Talkdesk will receive them and ensure they have the correct back-end configuration.

Nonetheless, you can proceed in advance when Talkdesk announced the porting date. The numbers will be available in your account and you can ensure they have the right setup in advance of the porting date:

• Update the number(s) friendly name(s).
• Assign the number(s) to Studio flow(s). 
• Define their ring groups. This is important for reporting purposes, and to ensure that the right agents have access to performing calls from the number(s).

Order cancellation requests

In case you need to cancel your porting process, please ensure that is done with, at least, two business days of advance notice of the porting date. To cancel your order, Talkdesk will need to inform every carrier partner involved, and that can take time according to the timezone and business days of each party. You can also inform your current carrier directly to ensure the numbers are not released.

Porting Rejection

Why was my port request rejected?

The majority of numbers are portable, however, there are some common reasons why the losing provider may reject a port request. In almost all cases, the rejections can be solved by contacting the current carrier and getting the correct and necessary information. 

If you want to prevent rejections, you should always contact your carrier first to make sure you have the right information or to request a Customer Service Record (CSR).

Here’s a list of the most common reasons for port request rejection:

Unsatisfactory Business Relationship

This one is probably one of the rarest, but it typically means that you have an unpaid balance or that your carrier charges a port-away fee. To resolve it, you have to pay any balance/fee to the provider and send us an e-mail to confirm this action.

All Data Mismatch/Name Mismatch/Address Mismatch/Company name Mismatch

This is exactly what it sounds like, meaning, the information you submitted on your Letter of Authorization (LOA) is different from what your carrier has on file. You should contact your carrier to learn what’s on your CSR and send us a new LOA with the right information. You may need to talk directly to your provider’s porting team in order to learn this information or to get a copy of the CSR.

Inactive Number

This means the numbers are not in service with the losing provider. To resolve this, you must contact your carrier so they can reinstate the numbers and contact us once the numbers are reactivated.

Unauthorized Signature

In this case, the person that’s authorized to make changes to the account is not the same person who signed the LOA. You have to reach out to the losing carrier to learn who’s this person or to update the authorized person, and then contact us so we can resubmit the request or send us a new LOA with the right signature.

Wrong Wireless Account PIN

In order to port wireless numbers, you have to give us a PIN. Note that the PIN is sometimes the last four digits of the account holder’s Social Security Number. To resolve this, you need to contact the carrier to obtain the PIN number they have on file and then e-mail us that information.

Incorrect/Missing Account Number

This means the Account number you submitted is wrong or it’s not there at all. You need to contact the losing carrier to learn the Account number and send us an e-mail with it.

 Invalid Billing Telephone Number (BTN)

The billing telephone number is typically a master number used to identify an account with many phone numbers. To solve this rejection, contact your provider to obtain the billing telephone number and e-mail us that information so we can resubmit the request.

Unportable Numbers

Unfortunately, there are some regions from which our telecom provider can’t port phone numbers. In this case, you can either buy a new number from us or use call forwarding.

Resold Account

To resolve this rejection, simply contact the losing carrier and request a CSR or provide detailed directions on how to port the number away.

Number Port Out

Can I take my numbers with me if I decide to leave Talkdesk?

Should you decide to leave Talkdesk, provided you have met all payment and other obligations under your Talkdesk agreement, you can port the numbers you have with us to another provider.

Please note that portability rules vary by country and not all countries provide support for portability.

In order to do this, you will need to contact your new provider; they will manage this process and inform you of any information/documentation required from us. There is no charge for port-aways.

Important:

• Please let us know in advance your intention to leave so we can authorize the request when it comes to us, otherwise, port-out requests can be automatically rejected.
• Your Talkdesk account must be kept active, and payment and other obligations under your Talkdesk agreement must be satisfied, until all the numbers you want to keep have been successfully ported out.

Talkdesk offers phone numbers in around 160 countries worldwide. 

There are three main types of phone numbers: 

• Local: Phone numbers tied to a particular city, region, or country. Local numbers are also called Direct Inward Dialing (DID) or Direct Dialing Inward (DDI). 
• Toll-free: Phone numbers designed for inbound voice calls, domestically reachable only and not accessible from payphones. Toll-free numbers from the United States can, however, be reached from Canada. Toll-free numbers are also called Freecall, Freephone, or International Toll-Free Service (ITFS). 
• Mobile: Phone numbers used for inbound or outbound calls and, depending on the country, may also be used with SMS/MMS/WhatsApp services. 

Our phone number coverage is regularly updated, but sometimes new countries and number types may not be immediately added to the list below. To get the latest information on phone number coverage, we recommend running a search on Admin > Numbers (step-by-step instructions here).

You can buy phone numbers from the United States and Canada directly from Admin > Numbers without providing proof of address or identity. For all other countries, legal regulations require that you provide us with the necessary documentation before you can purchase phone numbers. You can submit a request to initiate this process directly from Admin > Numbers or on our Support portal.

When reaching out to us, please include the following details: 

• Your Talkdesk account name/URL; 
• Country or countries from which you need to purchase phone numbers; 
• Amount of numbers required; 
• Type of number; 
• Number prefix (if applicable); 
• Products or features, and associated use cases, for which phone numbers are needed (e.g., SMS, Talkdesk Office, PCI payments). 

Regulatory requirements for phone numbers continue to increase; at Talkdesk we are committed to helping customers stay compliant. A team member will review your request and inform you which documentation is required. This may include a business registration or proof of address matching the location of the phone number. We will purchase the phone numbers on your behalf and keep the documentation in the event that we are contacted by the regulatory bodies. 

Depending on the phone numbers and features, you or your company's status in the country, and the intended usage of the numbers, different laws and regulations may apply. 

While some of these are new, many have been in effect for some time. Countries are increasing enforcement for many reasons – including fraud, incidents of misuse and abuse, and heightened national security concerns. These regulations are subject to change on a regular basis, as local authorities are constantly reviewing them. 

All your phone numbers must stay compliant with individual country requirements, or they will be at risk of being suspended until you submit the proper documentation. 

If any changes occur after you have acquired a number, the Talkdesk team will alert you and request additional documentation where applicable.

Note: Regulatory and compliance measures vary by country. For more information on other supported countries and the number purchasing process, review the article on worldwide coverage.

Talkdesk is fully committed to supporting all its current and future customers in their pursuit to be customer-obsessed and elevate their Customer Experience operations. This commitment spans across the geographies in which customers operate, including India.

India is estimated to be one of the top markets globally in the contact center industry and currently, Talkdesk has customers with operations in India supported by a viable, TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) compliant solution. Talkdesk supports both domestic and international use cases, including coverage for the four major regions of India, without any required intervention or additional configuration to the systems. Details of supported use cases and number purchase options are available from your Talkdesk representative.

Please note that India's regulations for the Telecommunications industry are known to be particularly fluid and can often be interpreted in many ways. Talkdesk has an ongoing and diligent process to check telecom regulations in India, hence we advise contacting us to understand any additional requirements, restrictions, or opportunities to support your customers.

Talkdesk Admin is where Administrators can configure account-wide settings. In this application, you can manage permissions, control product-specific features, and define preferences for your account. 

Talkdesk Admin is available as an application in Workspace with the same capabilities as in Talkdesk Classic, except for Studio and Integrations, which can be found on Workspace as freestanding apps. For more information on these apps, please refer to the Talkdesk Studio and the Talkdesk Builder articles. 

Note: Depending on your account’s setup, some tabs may not be available, or you may see additional tabs not listed below.

Within Talkdesk Admin, you will find distinct tabs that allow you to perform specific actions.

[Account]

• Customization: Set up the basic configurations of the account’s Workspace (“Language”,  “Keep on top” and "Bring to front").
• Preferences: Configure your account’s timezone, and metrics, among others.
• Security Settings: Configure how the user session behaves for improved security reasons (e.g., force the user to log out when inactive), login settings, password policies, and support access.
• Holiday Hours: Set up your business’ inoperable time (only applicable to Classic Routing).
• Security Settings: Choose an SSO provider for login, toggle account login, set password complexity requirements, mandate agents to use two-factor authentication (2FA), and grant support team access for configuration and troubleshooting.
• Emergency Calls: Configure the account’s emergency information.

[People]

• Users: Add and manage users (replaces the “Agents” tab in 2024).
• Teams: Create groups of agents by skills, departments, languages, or others.
• Roles and Permissions: Define and manage user roles.

[Service Settings]

• Numbers: Purchase and manage phone numbers.
• Channels: Configure voice and digital channel settings.
• Email: Available for accounts that have the email channel enabled. 
• Dispositions: Defining the outcome of a call.
• Callbacks: Available for accounts in the Scheduled Callback EA program that have the application “Callback Scheduler Configurations” installed.
• Storage and Retention: Call, voicemail, and screen recording retention policies.
• AI Launchpad: Configure and manage the core capabilities of your Talkdesk AI-powered products.
• Verint Connector: Available for accounts with the Talkdesk Verint WFM Connector enabled.
• MS Teams Connector: Available for accounts with the Talkdesk Microsoft Teams Connector enabled. 

[Routing]

• Attributes: Assign characteristics or skills to specific users.
• Queues: Streamlined access to manage, create, and assign agent queues.
• Continuity Settings: Configure the behavior of calls during a service disruption period.

[Industries]

• Industries Physicians List: Available for accounts that have Healthcare Experience Cloud enabled.
• Locations Directory: Available for accounts that have Industries Experience Cloud enabled.
• Automated Notifications: Available for accounts that have Industries Experience Cloud enabled.

[Billing]

• Overview: Manage your billing, and get real-time balance and payment history.
• Subscription: View information on subscriptions, licenses, and add-ons.
• Usage: Track and manage the available credits in your account's products and services.
• Invoices: View and download your account’s invoices.

For more information about the available features, explore our Knowledge Base.

By default, account Administrators have access to the Admin app where they can configure account-wide settings using the Preferences tab.

Below you can find an overview of the Preferences with a brief explanation of each one.

• General Settings
• Device Settings
• Routing Settings
• Queue Settings
• Metrics Settings
• Call Settings
• Agent Workflow
• Login Settings
• Storage Settings
• Voicemail Settings
• Contact Profile
• SMS Settings
• Login on Talkdesk Workspace
• Mobile Agent App

Please note that some features will only be available on certain plans.

General Settings

Time Zone

Your account's timezone.

Business Hours

Configure your account's opening hours.

Blocklist

Configure a list of phone numbers that you wish to block from contacting you.

Default Prefix

Change the default country prefix that is used with outbound calls.

Device Settings

Device connection

Enable the "Multiple Device Mode" or "Single Device Mode" for the account. Please note that this action is irreversible and that this setting will be locked afterward.

Note: New accounts have "Single Device Mode" enabled by default and the option "Multiple Device Mode" is unavailable. Studio can only be used with "Device connection" set to "Single Device Mode" and in order to assign numbers to flows and receive calls in Studio, “Single Device Mode” always needs to be enabled. 

Multiple Device Mode - Receive Calls in Browser / External Phone / SIP Phone

Configure in which devices your agents will receive Inbound calls.

Single Device Mode - Allow External Phone / Allow SIP Device

Select which devices you allow your agents to connect.

Routing Settings

Number of Agents to Ring

Number of agents to ring at a time when a new call comes in. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Intelligent Reconnect 

Allow callers that were disconnected within the past 5 minutes to have the option to resume their previous conversation. Note: The setting may not apply when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

After Hours IVR

When enabled, the IVR of your numbers will be active during closing hours. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Automatic Away

Force a status change to Away for any agent that fails to take a specified number of calls in sequence.

Agent IVR

Enable or disable the Agent IVR feature for the whole account; this feature can be used when there are external phone numbers associated with agents or numbers. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Custom Error Message

Set up a text-to-speech message to play in the highly unlikely event of service disruption.

Auto-Answer

When this feature is enabled, calls are automatically answered within one second.

Queue Settings

Queue to Voicemail

Allow a customer in the queue to request a Voicemail, and set the digit that will trigger this action. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Queue Callback

Allow a customer in the queue to request a Callback, and set the digit that will trigger this action. Note: The setting may not be available  when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Maximum Queue Size

When the specified number is reached, all additional callers will be sent to voicemail. Note: The setting may not apply when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Forced Queuing

When enabled, your callers will remain in the waiting queue during business hours regardless of agent availability. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Waiting Time Limit

When this limit is reached for a queued call, it will be sent to voicemail or an if-no-answer number. Note: The setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Metrics Settings

Service Level Threshold

Calls answered within the chosen threshold will be considered as meeting Service Level.

Filter Short Abandoned Calls

Short calls that are abandoned before the chosen threshold will not be reported as abandoned.

Report Files Retention Period

Explore has no execution list. Instead, you have the reports' executions in your email. These are the exports requested either through the Send or Schedule options in Explore. These files are available for 30 days; after this time, the data still exists stored in the database, although it's not downloadable via the email link sent to you.

Reporting Data Retention Period

In Explore (UI and API): The setting Reporting Data Retention Period allows admins to define for how long Talkdesk should keep the account’s historical data. If the value is “1” (minimum value), we will show you the data for 1 day. If you don't set any value in the Reporting Data Retention Period you will have access to the historical data defined at the report/dashboard/dataset level. Check more information in our Data Dictionary and Developers Docs.

Call Settings

Automatically Close Call Summary Window

The "Call Summary" window will automatically close after the set amount of time.

Inbound/Outbound Call Recording

Enable or disable the recording of calls. Note: The inbound setting may not apply when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Agent-initiated Pause Recording

Allow your agents to pause the recording during a call.

Caller Connection Tone

When enabled, agents will hear a beep when they are connected with the caller.

Dual Channel Recordings

When enabled, it will generate call recordings in stereo with the agent on one channel and the caller/callee on the other channel.

Call Quality Feedback

If enabled, agents will be given the option to rate the quality of the call, when it ends, in the call disposition window.

Agent Workflow

Custom Status

Add or edit Agent Status.

Default Agent Status

The status that agents are set to after logging in.

Agent Next Status

When enabled, agents will be able to select their next status while on a call or during wrap-up.

Desktop Notifications

When enabled, agents will be notified as they receive a call, even if their browser is minimized.

Outbound Caller ID Selection

"Customized" allows agents to select which Talkdesk number to use for outbound calls and "Automated" makes this process automatic.

External Favorites

Configure a list of favorite phone numbers.

Login Settings

Login settings are now accessible from the Admin - Security Settings app. 

A link to this new section is available in the Preferences tab.

Storage Settings

Delete Call and Voicemail Recordings

When enabled, call and voicemail recordings older than the selected period will be periodically removed.

Data Storage Provider

Define where you would like to store call and voicemail recordings.

Voicemail Settings

Voicemail Enabled

Configure if voicemail is enabled in your account. Note: This setting may not be available when there is a Studio Flow assigned to a number.

Transcriptions

Configure if voicemail transcriptions are enabled in your account. Note: This setting is only available to Classic Inbound Routing. To know how to activate voicemail transcriptions with Studio, please refer to Voicemail component - Preferences.

Maximum Length

Maximum length for voicemail recordings in minutes.

Contact Profile

Custom Fields

Additional fields to be displayed on the contact's profile.

SMS Settings

SMS (Beta)

If you have Salesforce installed, you can activate your SMS (BETA) service here.

Login on Talkdesk Workspace

Activate Talkdesk Workspace as the default login experience
By selecting this option your agents will log in to Talkdesk Workspace instead of Classic.

Mobile Agent App

Enable or disable Talkdesk Conversations Mobile App™ for all users.

Talkdesk AI Launchpad is a cross-functional application that provides the core capabilities required to configure and manage your Talkdesk AI-powered products in a do-it-yourself approach.

With AI Launchpad, you can set up and operate your products without Talkdesk support. This application supports Talkdesk Copilot™ and the Customer Experience Analytics bundle (composed of Talkdesk Interaction Analytics™ and Talkdesk QM Assist™), where you can enable AI models or voice transcriptions, among other options.

To access AI Launchpad, go to your Workspace, select “Admin” and click on AI Launchpad from the side panel [1]. The My area main page [2] is displayed when you access the AI Launchpad app.

In this area, you will see: 

• Onboarding cards [3]: Two onboarding cards to help you configure different AI flows for each of the products. 
  • The Voice Transcription card enables you to select multiple languages, including a default one, and add agents or ring groups for those languages. 
  • The AI Models card allows you to add one or more AI Models to each language once the voice transcription is configured.

• AI Flows section [4]: An AI Flow is a representation of your AI product configuration assets. Within this tab, you will be able to see: 
  • Product [5]: Copilot or Customer Analytics Experience.
  • AI Flow name [6]: The name you have chosen for your AI Flow. In our example, the name is “Default AI flow”.
  • Language [7]: The language with which your flow is associated. 
  • Ring group [8]: The ring group(s) assigned to the language. 
  • AI model [9]: The AI model(s) enriching the AI Flow.

• Flow status [10]: The statuses of your flow.
  • “Progress” means that Talkdesk is currently provisioning your flow. 
  • “Ready” means it was successfully configured. 
  • “Error” means there was an error when provisioning the AI flow, and it is automatically set to “Deactivated”. 

• “More options” button [11]: Use it to edit or delete an AI flow. 
• Tier tab [12]: Next to each product in AI Launchpad, you can see a label with its corresponding tier. This tier is a reference so that you understand which capabilities are enabled by your subscription plan. By selecting the Tier tab, you can have an overview of which products you have inside the 3 tiers: “Starter”, “Standard”, or “Premium”.
• AI Resources tab [13]: In this tab, you can view and manage all the AI models available in your account, create new models, and edit or delete existing models.

This article shows all the steps to create a Talkdesk Autopilot™ in AI Launchpad™, with explanations about each field and capability.

To create a new Autopilot, please follow these steps:

1. Log in to your Talkdesk account as an Administrator.

2. Select the “more options” button [1].

3. Click on Admin [2].

A new window with a drop-down menu pops-up. 

4. Select AI Launchpad [3].

5. Go to AI Resources [4].
6. Click Create new [5].

7. On the new sidebar:

• “AI Model type”: Pick the “Conversational model” option [6] from the menu.
• “Name”: Set up a name [7] for your Autopilot.
• “Description”: Write down a brief summary [8] of your Autopilot topic.
• “Select your service provider”: Choose the Talkdesk option [9]. In this case, the Talkdesk option allows building a Autopilot from scratch, with all its features available. However, if you already have built a bot to integrate with the Talkdesk call center, you must choose the Bring Your Own Bot (BYOT) option.
• Choose the language from the menu [10]. In the example above, we selected English.

8. Click Create AI Model [11] when you’re done.

The new Autopilot is now visible on the “AI Resources” menu inside the AI Launchpad.

Now, go to “Home” [12], and select Autopilot [13] from the drop-down menu.

Your recently created Autopilot is already available for editing and customizing.

For more information on Autopilot, please read our documentation.

How do I create my own Autopilot?

Can I connect to a Natural Language Understanding (NLU) provider?

How do I record Autopilot’s calls?

How do I set up a testing environment for my Digital Autopilot?

How can the Autopilot say numbers as digits instead of complete numbers?

Why does Autopilot not recognize what I’m saying?

Why does the Simulator/Session monitor show an Empty message warning?

Should I use Knowledge Management tool panel or Search Knowledge component?

Why does my Autopilot not produce audio but works on Simulator?

How do I create my own Autopilot?

Please follow the steps in the Creating an Autopilot in Launchpad article.

Can I connect to a Natural Language Understanding (NLU) provider?

Yes. When setting up virtual agents in AI Launchpad, you can connect to Talkdesk or a supported external AI provider.

How do I record Autopilot’s calls?

To record a Autopilot’s voice call, you can add the “Record” component in Talkdesk Studio™ to start the recording (the image below shows an example). If this component is placed before the Connect to Autopilot Studio component, then you will include this audio in the interaction recording. Then, you can listen to the recording in the “Activities” app.

How do I set up a testing environment for my Digital Autopilot?

To set up a testing environment, go to “Admin” > “Channels” > “Chat” and click on “Create touchpoint”. Then, insert your domain and a name for the chat, and add the widget code to your page; the Autopilot will be ready to use for testing.

Tip: you can use the platform codesandbox.io to create mock pages to insert the widget code.

How can Autopilot say numbers as digits instead of complete numbers?

By default, the Speech-to-text from the Autopilot will present a number as a spoken number instead of the digits that constitute the number. This behavior can be changed by introducing spaces between the digits (done with a function component) or by using SSML in the message. 

Why does Autopilot not recognize what I’m saying?

For Autopilot to start understanding what the user is requesting, training phrases must be associated with it. If the Autopilot is responding with the Default fallback then it means that it is not understanding the utterance and that sentence should be added to the training phrases. This can be done by using AI Trainer. 

Why does the Simulator/Session monitor show an Empty message warning?

An empty response from the Autopilot will not produce audio, it will only show the user utterance in the Simulator/Session monitor.

This issue is usually caused by having an empty state in the conversation. The possible empty states are:

• The session reached the error exit of an execute action when the Execute action component does not have the error exit defined.
• The session reached the error exit of a function when the Function component does not have the error exit defined. 
• The session reached the default exit of a split flow when the Split flow component does not have the default exit defined.

Should I use Knowledge Management tool panel or Search Knowledge component?

In Autopilot it is possible to connect your Knowledge Management using the Knowledge Management tool panel global setting or the Search Knowledge component.

• Knowledge Management tool panel: Using the global setting, you grant Autopilot the ability to query Knowledge management (KM) before proving the conversation miss (i.e., when the Autopilot cannot handle the contact's query).
• Search Knowledge component: Using the search component, you can query KM at a specific moment in the conversation for better control and custom search settings (eg. you want to fetch a KM card for a particular troubleshooting step).

Why does my Autopilot not produce audio but works on Simulator?

This typically occurs when a selected language does not have support for Voice. You should consult the AI Supported Languages table to check if the language selected has support for Voice on Autopilot.

Note: This product has additional usage costs. 

• How does Autopilot Voice work?
• Configuring Autopilot Voice
• Autopilot Limits
• Autopilot Timeouts

Talkdesk Autopilot™ (formerly known as Talkdesk Virtual Agent™) Voice is an artificial intelligence-powered conversational assistant that autonomously solves customers’ issues with a human-like experience.

It analyzes the customer’s speech and intents and automatically answers requests without the need for a human agent. 

Since it automates conversations, it is particularly useful in handling recurrent questions related to scheduling, billing, delivery tracking, or order management. 

With Autopilot Voice, you can provide an around-the-clock service that will enhance customer satisfaction while reducing costs and releasing your agents from repetitive customer interactions to enable them to engage in more complex tasks.

How does Autopilot Voice work?

Once an incoming call from the customer is received in your contact center, it goes into a Studio flow, where the Autopilot Studio component is executed. As soon as the customer asks a question, technologies such as Speech-to-Text, Text-to-Speech, Natural Language Understanding (NLU), Natural Language Processing (NLP), and Natural Language Generation (NLG) are put in place to understand and provide the necessary answers to the customer.

To do that, the system draws on the connection to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems such as Salesforce, or Zendesk, or even to external APIs to gather all the necessary information. At the same time, the system will evaluate sentiment and interpret the customer’s emotions to match them with the desired outcomes.

 Note: This tool is available in different languages. For more information, please see the Autopilot column in the Speech-to-Text Supported Languages article. 

Once all this data is collected, the system will provide an answer to the customer or escalate the call and hand off the data to a live agent, who can process a more complex request.

While the call handling process happens in Studio, your contact center Supervisor can monitor the session in real-time. By installing the Autopilot application in Workspace, it is possible to observe the number of calls being simultaneously handled by Autopilot, the general sentiment expressed in each of these calls as well as on each of the uttered sentences, or the live visual identification of a sentence that Autopilot was not trained to deal with.

In this application, there is a History tab available, that allows your contact center Supervisor to access recordings of past interactions in an attempt to identify possible gaps and opportunities for improvement. 

Configuring Autopilot Voice

If you wish to start using Autopilot Voice, please contact Talkdesk.

The configuration of Autopilot consists of the following steps: 

1. Installing Autopilot in Workspace: This installation aims at performing specific configurations and monitoring live and archived sessions. 
2. Creation of a Autopilot: This is an internal configuration step, in which our teams create a custom Autopilot. 
3. Creation of a conversation flow through an automated conversation builder. This is also an internal configuration step, in which our teams create a conversation flow following your business needs.
4. Configuring Autopilot Component in Studio. 

Autopilot Limits

To ensure the correct functioning of Autopilot and of each component, Talkdesk establishes default service limits, as described in the table below: 

Autopilot Timeouts

Inactivity Timeout

While in Autopilot, define an "Inactivity message" that is triggered after 8 seconds of silence (to recover the conversation). 

Hangup Timeout

• With Inactivity: The voice call timeout is triggered 32 seconds after the Autopilot finishes saying the Inactivity message and it doesn’t receive any message from the user.
• Without Inactivity: The voice call timeout is triggered 40 seconds after the Autopilot finishes its message and the user does not send any message in reply.

• How does Autopilot Digital work?
• Configuring Autopilot Digital
• Autopilot Limits
• Autopilot Timeouts

Talkdesk Autopilot™ (formerly known as Talkdesk Virtual Agent™) Digital is a conversational assistant that delivers customers the answers they need quickly and easily, where and when they want it on digital channels.

It provides an effective alternative to support customers in offline or peak hours and delivers a near-human conversational experience to the customer.

A Web Messenger widget implemented on your website enables your customers to contact you at any time, over the web or mobile application.

How does Autopilot Digital work?

Once a message from the customer is sent through the Web Messenger widget that has been implemented in your webpage and received in your contact center, it goes into a conversation flow that has been previously designed in the automated conversations' builder. As soon as the customer sends a message, the AI Natural Language Processing (NLP) technology is put in place to understand and provide the necessary answers to the customer. The system will be evaluating intents and entities and interpret the customer’s needs to match them with the desired outcomes.

To do that, the system also draws on the connection to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems or external APIs to gather all the necessary information and provide the most natural, human-like replies to the customers’ inquiries.

While the conversation flow happens in the conversation orchestrator, your contact center Supervisor can monitor the session in real time. By installing the Autopilot application in Workspace, it is possible to observe the messages being simultaneously handled by Autopilot, or the live visual identification of a sentence that Autopilot Digital was not trained to deal with. In this application, there is a “History” tab available, that allows your contact center Supervisor to access past interactions, in an attempt to identify possible gaps and opportunities for improvement.

Configuring Autopilot Digital

The configuration of Autopilot Digital consists of the following steps: 

1. Installing Autopilot in Workspace: This installation aims at performing specific configurations and monitoring live and archived sessions. 
2. Creation of a digital Autopilot: This is an internal configuration step, in which our teams create a specific digital Autopilot.  
3. Configuring the Web Messenger integration: The Talkdesk Web Messenger integration can be configured by accessing the Autopilot “Channels” tab, selecting “web widget”, copying the code snippet available on the page, and pasting it into an integrated development environment (IDE) of your choice to make Autopilot Digital available in your website.

For more information on this product, please read through our Autopilot documentation.

Autopilot Limits 

To ensure the correct functioning of Autopilot and of each component, Talkdesk establishes default service limits, as described in the table below: 

Autopilot Timeouts

When a session is not terminated by the Autopilot on digital channels it will be finished after 15 minutes of not receiving any messages from the user. 

Talkdesk Builder™ is a self-service platform that allows you to tailor Talkdesk to your specific needs

Within Builder, you will find the Integrations tab, where you can add and manage useful integrations. 

To access the application in Workspace, please follow these steps: 

1. Click on the corresponding icon [1].
2. Then, to see the integration list, click the Integrations tab [2].

On this page, you have access to the Integrations associated with your account. Select an integration to configure it or to add automated tasks. You can also add new integrations to your account by clicking the Add integration button.

For more information about the available features, please refer to our Integrations documentation and Builder documentation in Developer Docs 

Talkdesk Cases™ is a simple, integrated app to help Agents and Administrators handle and manage cases for complex customer requests that require follow-ups.

Main Capabilities

Talkdesk Cases features a holistic array of practical capabilities to empower both Administrators and Agents. 

Voice, Voicemail, and Email Integration

Voice Integration represents an important feature in Talkdesk Cases, as cases can be automatically created or updated for inbound and outbound calls. Similarly, Voicemail Integration ensures that cases can be automatically generated when contacts leave voicemail messages for unanswered calls. The same is true for e-mails. 

Voice Integration and Voicemail Integration control automatic case creation and update behaviors are based on automated tasks associated with them. Administrators can edit these automated tasks to set custom tasks, such as when cases are automatically created, and what case fields should be prepopulated with certain values.

Case Processing

Talkdesk Cases features a comprehensive toolkit that helps Agents handle and manage cases across their entire lifecycle. It ensures seamless coordination between frontline and back-office Agents as they are equipped with consistent, efficient tools. Specifically, Agents can perform the following main operations:

• Create subcases for a root case.
• Add notes and attachments to a case.
• Edit case properties.
• Download call and voicemail recordings.
• View case events.
• Add tags to cases.
• Merge cases.
• Switch between case tabs.
• Resolve and reopen cases.
• Delete and restore cases.

Note: Automatic case creation and updating is only supported on voice, voicemail, and email channels.

On the back of other features such as Service Level Agreements and Time-based Automations, the above-mentioned operations can be carried out in a more smooth manner.

Custom Fields

Created by Administrators, custom fields are properties in addition to standard fields to help Agents store additional information about a request. They serve as a flexible approach to collecting targeted information, as Agents can take action accordingly based on them, thus accelerating time to resolution.

Similar to standard fields, custom fields can be used in other features of Talkdesk Cases as well, such as Case Processing, Service Level Agreements, and Time-based Automations.

Case Forms

Case forms in Talkdesk Cases enable Agents to collect and manage case information in a centralized way. Administrators are able to create case forms by configuring both standard fields and custom fields in them. When Agents work on cases, they can select the desired case form to collect information. As Administrators understand more how fields in case forms help Agents improve efficiency and deliver personalized services, they can further edit, deactivate, or delete case forms as needed.

Views and Filters

Case views display different lists of cases that meet certain criteria. By default, Talkdesk Cases provides six case views that are available to all users. Besides, to quickly navigate to specific cases, all users can leverage filters, a property-based method for case searching, to create custom views depending on their roles:

• Agents can apply filters to create custom case views for themselves.
• Administrators can apply filters to create custom case views for themselves, for a group of Agents, or for all Agents.

Service Level Agreements

A Service Level Agreement (SLA) is a commitment between you and your customer. In Talkdesk Cases, Administrators can create SLA policies by defining conditions and setting time targets for cases at different priority levels. SLA policies take effect on cases that meet the conditions defined.

When an SLA policy is applied to cases, Agents can view the remaining time in case views and on the case processing page, thus prioritizing tasks and taking measures accordingly before any breach.

Automations

Automations in Talkdesk Cases are automatic tasks executed by Talkdesk to streamline workflows and minimize workloads for Agents. Administrators are responsible for creating automations by defining conditions and setting actions. They can preview cases that meet the conditions before an automation is created. When an automation runs, the predefined actions will be carried out on applicable cases. Automations can be time or event based. With automations, Talkdesk Cases can, for example:

• Update case properties automatically.
• Notify Agents when subcases are resolved.
• Send automatic notifications to a specific Agent or a group of Agents when cases remain in a certain status for a predefined period of time.

With time-based automations, Agents are freed from repetitive tasks so that they can stay focused on more urgent requests. You can learn more about Event-based Automations here, or go here to learn about Time-based Automations.

Reporting

Talkdesk Cases provides a centralized way to receive, route, and resolve issues raised by end users. With powerful observability features in Reporting, Administrators can view and keep track of important data related to these issues, helping them measure performance, identify problems, and gain insights. In this way, they are better positioned to make data-driven decisions.

Note: Currently, team performance is not supported in Reporting.

Currently, there are two dashboards about Talkdesk Cases that are available in Talkesk Explore™.

• Case: Displays case volumes by different metrics such as time (week, day, and hour) and case fields.
• Case SLA: Displays SLA achievements and breaches by time (week and day) and priority levels.

Talkdesk Conversation Orchestrator™ enables you to stream the agent and/or caller audio in real-time.

It streams voice calls efficiently, securely, and in a scalable way, to different internal and external customer applications, through standard APIs using Studio components. 

Conversation Orchestrator can be connected to various types of features and applications, such as Autopilot, Copilot, voice biometrics, voice transcription/translation, and real-time voice/speech analytics. Customers and partners can then have secure access to the raw audio stream of any phone call using these features and applications. 

Talkdesk Conversation Orchestrator supports multiple unidirectional streams that can be used by other applications to do intent detection, speech-to-text, and voice biometrics,  among other use cases. It also supports one bidirectional stream where an Autopilot can participate in a conversation.

Make every agent your best agent with the Talkdesk Copilot™ (formerly known as Agent Assist) application.

A day of work in a  call center will often involve short, repetitive interactions, sustained over long periods of time. The agent is asked to quickly understand problems and provide solutions while navigating through several informational systems and carrying an empathetic conversation at the same time.

Copilot helps agents overcome those challenges of a high cognitive workload, by using Artificial intelligence (AI) to:

• Transcribe the conversation in real-time, helping the agent to keep track of what customers are saying and highlighting what is most relevant.
• Automatically search for the most appropriate answers to customer queries and present them to the Agent, avoiding the need to jump between different applications.
• Present real-time conversational guidance and automate business processes when appropriate.

This app connects directly with Talkdesk Knowledge Management™, which allows you to build your own AI-ready Knowledge Base or connect an existing one. To get a list of Knowledge Base connectors, check this article.

Bear in mind that Copilot can also transcribe calls in multiple languages. To get a full list of the languages, visit this page. 

In the sections below, you can find information about: 

• Accessing Copilot
• Ongoing Interactions
• “Interaction Summary” Screen

Accessing Copilot

Following purchase of the Copilot add-on, it will be available in your Talkdesk account, meaning no additional installation is required.

This app can be accessed through the Talkdesk Workspace Secondary Area panel [1].

Besides the search bar and the icon to access the bookmarks area, which is located at the top of the application, you will be able to see:

• Copilot quick onboarding tips [2]: These messages can be dismissed by the user and will no longer be presented.
• “Trending topics” [3]: Trending topics are captured based on the intent model connected to Copilot. To learn more about intent models and how to train them using Talkdesk AI Trainer™, check this page. If you do not have an intent model connected to Copilot, or if your model is empty, this widget will not be shown. For each trending topic, Copilot will highlight the top-recommended article from the Knowledge Base (if there is content in Talkdesk Knowledge Management, either created in the application or connected through an external knowledge base). The topics presented are the most common for the last seven days.
• “Most frequent searches” [4]: These will be the top search queries made by all users on the application in the last seven days. Please note that agents are only able to get search results if there is content in Talkdesk Knowledge Management, either created in the application or connected through an external knowledge base.

Note: For details on how to edit users for Talkdesk Copilot please read this article and this section.

Ongoing Interactions

The Copilot interface will automatically change as soon as an interaction starts.

On voice interactions, the call transcription will begin, and recommendations will be generated and presented below the transcription.

Agents can interact with the transcription by hovering their cursor on top of each transcription bubble. They can perform a search using the sentence inside the bubble, without the need to copy and paste it into the search box. They can also click to copy the sentence to the clipboard and then paste it whenever needed.

On digital interactions (Talkdesk Chat and SMS only), Copilot will present a list of recommendations.

Once a user clicks on a recommendation, either during a voice or a digital interaction, a new page will be opened with the full content, which can be evaluated (thumbs up/thumbs down) or bookmarked.

“Interaction Summary” Screen

Once an interaction ends, Copilot will present the “Call summary” wrap-up screen. Within it, agents can still revisit information from the call and use it to ease the after-call work, if necessary. Copilot also enables agents to download the “Call summary” information so that it is available for consultation afterward.

Within the “Call summary” screen, you can find the following cards: 

• “Highlights”: Reveals the main topics of discussion that took place throughout the call.  
• “Recommendations”: Shows the recommended articles that were suggested during the call. This allows agents to navigate through the recommendations. To open one of the suggested articles, simply click on it.
• "Transcription”: Presents the full transcription of the call and enables agents to copy information from the transcription. To do so, hover over a transcription bubble and select the “Copy” button on the pop-up window that is displayed.

Note: The transcription is only accessible until the agent gets the next call. 

Talkdesk CX Sensors™ is an alert system that allows supervisors to improve interaction quality by detecting customer experience events in real-time. With CX Sensors, you can set up alerts based on specific keywords or phrases, so you can proactively coach agents and avoid escalations. 

Enabling real-time transcription for CX Sensors

To enable real-time transcription for CX Sensors, please follow the instructions provided in the Configuring AI Launchpad documentation.

Accessing CX Sensors  

To access the "CX Sensors" page, please follow the steps below:

1. Log in to your Talkdesk account on workspace using your credentials [1].

2. Click on the Interaction Analytics [2] option. 

3. Select the CX Sensors tab [3].

CX Sensors Data

When accessing the "CX Sensors" page, you will be presented with a list of your currently defined CX Sensors, as well as the following data:

• Refresh [1]:  By clicking on this button, all the information displayed on the list will be updated.
• You’ll see the total number of configured CX Sensors [2].
• Create Sensor button [3]: Click this button to open the “Create Sensor” side panel, where you can define your sensor’s characteristics.
• “Sensor name” [4]: The name given to the sensor.
• “Category” [5]: The category defined for the sensor.
• “# Hits” [6]: Updated number of sensor hits. 
• The arrow next to “# Hits” provides the ordering of the list.
• Pencil icon [7]: By clicking on the pencil icon, it will open the “Edit Sensor” side panel.
• More Options button [8]: If you select this button, both the notifications ON/OFF toggle and the “Delete sensor” disappear.

Click on the link that we provided to start the installation process:

To configure the Talkdesk Dialer™ app, follow these steps:

1. Choose the plans and define the users who will have access to the app, and hit Next [1].

Note: Only admins can install and manage the app. Supervisors can see it and the agent doesn’t see it at all.

2. Finish your settings set up, agree with the “Terms & Conditions”, and click on Install [2].

You’ll receive a confirmation email when the request has been approved and once the app has been installed.

When the installation is complete, you can access the Talkdesk Dialer app by:

1. Selecting Admin [1].
2. Choosing My Apps [2].

Talkdesk Digital Engagement™ provides integrated customer support through SMS, chat, email, social messaging, and more. 

It creates a unified experience for both agents and clients, with capabilities spanning digital and voice channels, from a single platform. This will allow visibility into every conversation and the possibility to provide a better and more personalized service.

Handling Conversations across Multiple Channels 

Now, Agents are able to switch seamlessly across channels within a single session. By using the intuitive interface, Agents are able to interact with customers in one channel, and elevate the conversation to any channel, including voice, maintaining all its context through informative Context and Contact Cards. 

For example, interactions with customers can begin with a chat, then move to SMS or a voice call while on the chat, and be followed up via email, all in a single session. Additionally, its centralized Inbox management system has a single interface for all channels, which contributes to reducing handle times.

At this time, Digital Engagement features Chat, Email, SMS, Digital Messaging, and Fax channels.

Multiple Routing Options 

In order to ensure that no customer queries go unanswered, teams can choose between simplified routing, or routing through Studio flows. This is proven to contribute to service efficiency and guarantees that customers are always connected with the right Agent.  

Routing can be determined by attributes such as Agent capacity, Agent presence, customer attributes, or other business needs such as office hours. For example, conversations can be routed to digital channels when there is a high volume of customer requests.

Integrations 

One of the key features of Digital Engagement is the possibility to integrate your Talkdesk account with your favorite CRM or other systems, by creating automations whenever a new digital conversation starts or ends.   

Centralized Tracking and Reporting

With Digital Engagement, teams are able to have a holistic view of the customer’s omnichannel journey, as well as keep up with their performances and customer satisfaction by tracking key engagement metrics. 

Supervisors can see actionable insights and obtain context on team performance, with centralized reporting across all digital channels. 

Digital Engagement allows Agents to interact with customers in their preferred channels and to keep up to date with their needs by switching between channels without losing context, thus boosting their contact center’s productivity. 

For more information on each channel, visit our Knowledge Base documentation in the new Digital Engagement section.

GDPR Compliance

GDPR is about transparency with data subjects and being able to comply with individual rights. Talkdesk already has several features in place that allow Admins to manage and address these individual rights, and we are continuing to develop new features and processes to make it even more customizable.

Please refer to this link for more information on Talkdesk and GDPR. 

Additional Resources:

Talkdesk Feedback generates multichannel customer experience data that turns into insights on Agent performance, customer retention, and loyalty.

Improve customer experience by deploying surveys across interactions. The reporting solutions turn data into actionable insights, focusing on contact center performance, and finally. With Feedback you can also automate actions to resolve issues in the customer journey, boosting efficiency and customer retention.

Installation and Activation

As a rule, all Talkdesk CX Cloud features come pre-installed. To access Feedback, simply click on the icon [1] on the left-side dock. 

If you’d like more information regarding options for manual installation and configuration of Talkdesk CX Cloud, please see our documentation here.

Survey Creation

Creating quality survey data is the key to understanding customer satisfaction, which is why we’ve created tools to help you create surveys with ease. Through the Flow Builder tool you’re able to create custom, dynamic SMS Surveys either from scratch or from a template. Then, attach that survey to a Talkdesk phone number, so it can be triggered after inbound or outbound calls. 

IVR Surveys are currently available as a template, through a number of different languages, that can be installed on your account in order to trigger after inbound calls through the Studio Get Feedback component. See more details below:

• Setting up an IVR Survey and available languages
• IVR Survey script

Note: We support the ability to track customer satisfaction (CSAT) and Net Promoter Score℠ (NPS) measures, as well as additional custom questions on a survey. 

Feedback Analysis and Reporting

Surveys can be supported to track key performance indicators (like customer satisfaction (CSAT) and Net Promoter Score ℠ (NPS) measures), as well as additional custom questions. 

Feedback offers a number of solutions to analyze and act on survey data collected:

• Live Feedback Stream with aggregated metrics.
• Feedback Flow Report* for raw response data.
• Explore API documentation for data extraction (available soon).

*Note: The Feedback Flow Report includes all the survey data that has been collected during a period of time, with details about the interaction and survey. Each entry has the response to an individual question or survey invitation. For more information, please read the Data Dictionary's Feedback Flow Report article.

Integrating and Taking Action on Data

Feedback integrates with all Talkdesk-supported integration platforms, such as Salesforce, Zendesk, Email notifier, and more. The numeric scores brought in from your CSAT KPIs can be leveraged for automations and data extraction available through our Talkdesk Integrations. 

Feedback Roles and Permissions

Access to the Feedback application can be controlled through custom roles, or by assigning a user to any of the default roles. 

Feedback Access: Default Roles

• Administrator default roles have full Feedback permissions.
• Agent default roles have no Feedback permissions. 
• Supervisor default roles have no Feedback permissions. 

Feedback Permissions: Custom Roles

You can access Feedback permissions by going to Admin > Roles and Permissions. When adding permissions to custom roles, scroll down to find the “Feedback” section. See the image below for an example.

Additional Resources

When you open Talkdesk Guardian™, you’re redirected to the “Overview” page.

In there, you can check the following information:

By default, the page shows an overview of Cases, but you can select the Users and sessions overview option on the drop-down menu.

Cases

In the Cases overview, you’ll see:

• Various insights and summaries on “Critical cases” [1].
• “Top risky agents” [2] information.
• “Top cases” [3] data.

You can filter the information by time period.

Tip: By default, it’s set up for the “Last 24 hours”, but you can customize it and select a date up to one year back.

Critical cases

In this widget, you can access more detailed information by clicking on one of the time frames.

In this example, if you click on Last 24 hours [1], a pop-up window will appear on the right side with the “Critical cases preview” [2], and with the agents’ names. If you select View all critical cases [3], you will be instantly redirected to the Cases page.

Under the number of detected cases, you will see the evolution of the selected filter in the previous 24 hours (the previous days, weeks, months, or years). In this example, the last 24h saw a 4.17% increase in critical cases. Besides this, if you hover the mouse over the graph, you can confirm the number of cases per day. If you click there, a new pop-up window will appear.

You can view the specific date and time of the occurrence, as well as the agents’ names. You can close the new window by clicking on the “X” icon in the top right corner.

At the bottom of this section, you have another bar. It allows you to zoom in and out the chosen time on the filters. To do that, you just need to hold-click and drag the handle.

Top risky agents

As an admin, you can use this widget to identify the riskier agents working on your project. You can also use it to find other details.

You can see the number of “Critical Cases” each agent had and the “Top 3 cases triggered”. Clicking on it will display more specific information, on the right side of the screen.

On the “Risky agent preview” [1], you’ll find the complete list of cases, arranged by date. You can access the complete case list for that agent. Just hit View all cases for this agent [2].

Top critical cases

On this graphical representation, you can easily recognize the different types of cases separated by color.

If you hover your cursor over the graph, you will get the number of cases for each type, also available in the list next to the graph.

User and sessions

If you select the Users and session overview option, on the drop-down menu, you’ll see the following:

The new page will display an overview of the active and inactive sessions in the last 24 hours.

Tip: You can select a different time period.

If you select View all sessions, you will be instantly redirected to the "Logs" page. If you hover your cursor over the graph, you will get the number of active or inactive sessions, also available in the list next to the graph.

Talkdesk Identity™ consists of the following features:

• Active and Passive Voice Authentication:
  Ability to leverage voice as an authentication factor. I.e. validating if the inbound callers are who they say they are by having them repeat a passphrase on an IVR and/or having them just speak normally (i.e. without any text dependency on a passphrase) while on a live call, and compare the user’s voice against a stored voiceprint for that user.

• Phone Validation:
  Ability to validate the number used by inbound callers in terms of profile and risk, while delivering those insights to the agent picking up the call and making them available to be leveraged as variables within Talkdesk Studio, for conditional-based routing purposes.
  External facing API can be called upon to deliver that same profile and risk insights to a number or array of numbers, enabling the integration with 3rd party systems.

• Spoofing Detection:
  Ability to detect the likelihood of a caller’s ID having been spoofed, displaying that information to the agent picking up the call,and making those insights available to be leveraged as variables within Talkdesk Studio, for conditional-based routing purposes.

How does Identity work? 

When a caller reaches your contact center and the call is assigned to an agent, the agent can see, in Conversations in the “Identity” tab, the caller’s available data in real-time. 

The first section you see is “Voice authentication,” where you’ll perform the authentication questions and collect the caller’s consent to start the enrollment process. 

The “Phone Validation” section shows you the background check that was automatically performed on the caller’s phone number.

Finally, the “Spoofing Detection” indicates potential scammers, warning you when the caller may not be the one that is displayed on the caller ID.

This information is also immediately available within the Identity app itself, where you’ll be able to compare risk scores and decide which actions you or your agents need to take. 

Configuring Identity

To configure the Spoofing detection and Phone validation features in Identity, it is necessary to configure the Validate phone component in Studio. Afterwards, both the Conversations and Identity apps will display the insights corresponding to the callers' phone numbers.

The setup of the Voice authentication feature consists of the following steps: 

1. Configuration of the Authenticate voice and Enroll voice components in Studio.
2. Voice enrollment through Conversations (only for first-time users that decide to opt into the feature) and subsequent monitorization of the caller’s authentication in the next calls.
3. Live supervision of enrollments and authentications in the Identity app.

Please check the Identity configuration articles for more information on the features' setup.  

For additional support, please contact Talkdesk Support.

Talkdesk Interaction Analytics™ captures, transcribes, and analyzes every customer interaction using artificial intelligence to identify key conversation moments, topics, and sentiments. This application helps you understand customer intent, uncover trends, and provide actionable insights into the business.

Note:  Talkdesk AI products use speech-to-text technology (STT) to transcribe everything during voice interactions. For more information about the currently supported languages and dialects, please consult the "Talkdesk AI - STT Languages" PDF attached at the bottom of this page.

Prerequisites

To use Interaction Analytics, Talkdesk’s routing system must be configured, and call recording must be enabled for both inbound and outbound calls.

Accessing and Managing the App

Once the app has been installed, you can access it through My Apps and select Interaction Analytics [1].

Access and Permissions

To manage which team members have access to Interaction Analytics, please follow these steps:

1. Go to the Interaction Analytics settings [1].

2. On the Users tab, [2] you can tick each user or role that should have access to Interaction Analytics [3]. If you need more information about roles, please visit the article Roles and Permissions.

3. On the Auto Install tab [4] you can select for which roles [5] Interaction Analytics is going to be automatically installed for newly added users (i.e., in case the "Agent" role was selected, then all newly added agents in the future would immediately have access to Interaction Analytics). 

 4. Once you’re finished, click Save changes [6].

Notes: 

• We advise giving access only to administrators, supervisors, and custom roles that have a specific need to access Interaction Analytics.
• You can designate which users/roles have access to a particular transcription and recording saved, in order to have more control over who has access to what type of information within “Search” and the “Transcription Card”.  To do so, go to the Admin >  Roles and Permissions tab > Permissions tab > “Calls” section. Each scope available in this section has different permission accesses:
  • “All”: Can access all interaction transcripts/recordings. 
  • “Agent”: Can only access the user’s specific interaction transcripts/recordings.
  • “Ring Group”: Can only access the interaction transcripts/recordings of the ring groups the user belongs to.  

When all configurations are done, you can start taking advantage of Interaction Analytics.

Talkdesk Knowledge Management™ is an AI-powered Knowledge Base that brings an integrated layer of Knowledge to your enterprise. It uses and organizes knowledge, taking into account how critical it is to have up-to-date and reusable information across an enterprise.

Knowledge Management also supports the ability to bring 3rd party content - see article External sources - so that products like Copilot or Autopilot receive the most accurate information, whether managed inside Talkdesk Knowledge Management or from 3rd party sources.

Once the app has been installed in your account, it can be accessed via My Apps [1].

Prerequisites

Access to the product is provisioned upon subscription of Autopilot or Copilot. Older legacy editions included the product standalone, but this is no longer supported.

If you are using the Talkdesk Copilot application, with Knowledge Management, you will have the capability of making search queries to Knowledge Management content and get answers without needing to open Knowledge Management. Same applies to Autopilot-mediated interactions where the content is seamlessly surfaced in Digital or Voice Autopilots directly off of your Knowledge Base.

Access and Permissions

To manage which team members have access to Knowledge Management, please follow these steps:

1. In your Talkdesk account, click on Knowledge Management [1].

2. Select the desired users [2].

3. Choose Save changes [3].

You should also make sure that administrators and supervisors are granted the right permissions, as described next.

For more information about roles, please visit the article Team Roles.

Permission to Create and Edit Content

• Leveraging Roles & Permissions

Talkdesk Phone™ is a business phone system natively built on the leading CX Cloud platform.  Extend our advanced contact center technology to your business communications, increase business agility across your organization, and realize significant cost savings from managing everything on a single platform. Collaborate internally or place outbound calls to anyone anywhere in the world you do business to bring teams together and build a culture of customer-centric collaboration.

Talkdesk Phone consists of two apps: Phone, for regular users and administrators, and Phone Admin, for administrators.

• Phone: This is where users will be able to handle calls and set up a few basic configurations. It includes the following features and areas:
• Home - To consult call history and voicemails and make and receive calls.
• Configurations - To manage user settings.
• Phone Admin: This app is specifically for administrators and includes the following controls:
• Users - To manage users.
• Devices - To manage devices.
• Ring groups - To manage ring groups.

Enablement

This product requires additional licensing.

When the installation process is complete and there are existing Contact Center (CC) users that should also be provided with access to Phone or Phone Admin, please follow these steps to grant them that access:

1. Click the My Apps [1] interface and click on the gear icon, placed on the top right-hand side corner of the Phone app or the Phone Admin app [2].

2. From the app management modal, you can tick each user or role that should have access to the app [3].

Then, to grant CC users access to the Phone and Phone Admin apps, go to Main > Admin > Roles and Permissions, and select the specific role you want to grant access to. Then, go to Permissions > Edit and, within the Talkdesk Phone permissions card, select “View”. For more information on this subject, read through our Roles and Permissions documentation.

Following the above steps, and in order to complete the process with the account extension to Phone, please reach out to us and provide the following information:

• Your existing Talkdesk account name.
• Optionally, the main phone number of the account. This is the “Company number” that will be used as the Caller ID for outbound calls by default.

Later on, via the Phone Admin app, you will be able to create and manage users, namely by assigning DID numbers (Direct Inward Dialing). 

Limitations

• Talkdesk Phone is only available for sale in the United States of America (USA), Canada (on US regional cloud), and the following European countries: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom. Talkdesk Phone is not available in the Canada regional Cloud, LATAM, or APAC regions.
• English is the only supported language.
• Voicemail is available in dial-in IVR format only. Visual voicemail, transcriptions, and voicemail-to-email are not supported.
• Some features currently available in CX Agent are not supported by Talkdesk Phone. These are: warm transfer, audio settings configuration, user activity status, Activities App, business contacts, agent contacts, favorites, Voicemails app. 
• Some features related to integrations are not supported by Talkdesk Phone. These are: Customer Relationship Managers (Salesforce, Zendesk, others), Talkdesk Builder, Talkdesk Workforce Management, Talkdesk Guardian, Talkdesk Copilot, Talkdesk Agent Workspace: Contacts/Voicemails/Activities. 

Notes: 

• Account phone numbers must be purchased in Main to be available for assignment to Talkdesk Phone users.
• To help users distinguish numbers, the phone number’s Friendly name (that can be defined in Main > Admin > Numbers) will be displayed in Phone, in the user’s Keypad Caller ID list, underneath each number. The Friendly name is only displayed to the user, not callees.
• Each user can have up to 5 DIDs.
• Newly created Phone users that do not have access to CC should receive a confirmation e-mail. The app should be available up to five minutes after the account is validated. 

Talkdesk Studio™ is a visual routing designer that makes it easy to design, build, and deploy effortless customer journeys with clicks instead of code, and intelligently route your customers to the best fitting agent. Avoid the complexity of mapping interactions, defining rules, and creating IVR menus. With Studio, it’s simple to see the exact flow structure and outcome of an interaction flow at any stage.

Talkdesk Studio is available as an application in Workspace with the same capabilities as in Talkdesk Classic.

To access the Studio application in Workspace, simply click on the corresponding icon [1].

Requirements

If you're new to Studio, please check our requirements to start using it.

Resources

To get started with the creation of flows, take our course:

• Academy Studio Course

For in-depth guidelines, check our FAQ and remaining documentation:

• Talkdesk Studio Advanced Documentation

Talkdesk Workforce Management™ (WFM) uses data and information from what happened in the contact center in the past to forecast what will happen in the future, help determine the required staffing, create schedules, and predict/project key Contact Center performance metrics.

WFM Workflow

The next image depicts the workflow, inputs, and outputs for WFM processing cycle:

Workflow Steps

Forecasting

Forecasting in Talkdesk Workforce Management includes three core statistics:

• Contact volume offered (CVO) is predicted for each 15-minute interval.
• Average handle time (AHT) is predicted for each 15-minute interval.
• Required staffing is calculated for each interval based on the predicted CVO and AHT.

CVO and AHT predictions use similar methods, so they will be described together below, although the process is performed independently for each statistic.

Selection of an appropriate forecast model is performed for each queue independently. This is done automatically at the beginning of each new forecast week, based on the data available at that time, with the following steps:

• An initial screening of the queue’s data narrows the range of models to be tested. For example, queues with very low volume will be tested against different models than queues with high volume.
• The applicable models are tested by using them to forecast recent completed weeks.
• The model that produces the most accurate results for each queue is selected for that queue.

Once models are selected, forecasts can be generated:

• The model for each queue is trained using the historical data for that queue.
• Adjustments for designated holidays and identified outliers are handled as appropriate within each model.
• CVO and AHT predictions are created/updated for every interval using the trained model(s) for all the weeks in the forecast timeline.
• Where applicable, predicted values for intervals outside currently enforced business hours are removed.

Once CVO and AHT are forecast for all queues, required staffing is calculated for each interval. The calculations used vary depending on the service level (SL) threshold of each queue:

• Staffing for queues with shorter SL thresholds is calculated using a modified Erlang formula.
• Staffing for queues with longer SL thresholds is calculated as workload, then redistributed across the SL threshold window (within the queue’s open hours).
• Shrinkage is then applied to the requirements for each interval.

On a nightly basis during the week, the previously selected model for each queue is re-trained with the latest historical data, and all forecast values are refreshed using the current configurations for the queue.

Smoothing Average Handle Time (AHT)

The AHT data for an interval can be subject to random spikes for various reasons, such as:

• Individual contacts having an outsized impact due to low volume.
• Agent misuse of the routing system, for example, going into a post-contact wrap-up state when they should be in a state that represents a break or meeting event.

Additionally, AHT may be missing from the initial forecast for some intervals due to lack of historical data, especially in queues or times of day with very low volumes.

To reduce the impact of these fluctuations on the forecasts for individual intervals, WFM smooths the forecasts by replacing the initial forecast values for each interval with a weighted average that includes forecast values from other intervals. For all intervals with a non-zero AHT forecast, the initial forecast is replaced with a moving weighted average:

• For each interval, calculates a weighted average that includes the initially forecasted AHT for that interval and the four nearest intervals with AHT values.
• If there are not four intervals, the average is based on the available intervals.
• Weighting is based on the forecasted Contact Volume Offered (CVO) for each interval.
  

Fill-In of Missing AHT

For intervals where CVO>=0 and AHT=0, the 0 should be replaced with a weighted average of four non-zero intervals:

• These should be the five nearest non-zero intervals to the target interval.
• Weighting should be based on the forecasted Contact Volume Offered (CVO) for each interval.
• If the forecast data set does not contain two non-zero intervals before the target interval (for example, if the target interval is one of the first intervals in the forecast), then it calculates the weighted average using the available non-zero intervals on the left (0, 1 or 2) and the available non-zero interval on the right (0, 1 or 2).
  

Carryover Rounding of Contact Volume Offered

Similarly to AHT, forecasted Contact Volume Offered (CVO) can be subject to random spikes, especially noticeable on low volume queues. To correct these artifacts, WFM processes the initial forecast applying carry-over rounding. The carryover rounding works as follows:

• Calculate the daily total forecast (from the unrounded intervals) and round it to the nearest integer.
  For the first interval of the day, round the forecast down to the nearest integer.
• Carry over the amount that is rounded down and add it to the next interval before rounding it.
• For the last interval of the day, round up or down as needed to match the rounded daily total.
  

Processing Order

WFM performs the described tasks in the following order:

1. Handle closed hours.
2. Carry over rounding of CVO.
3. Fill in missing AHT.
4. Smooth AHT.

Intraday Reforecasting

Intraday Reforecasting helps optimize resource planning with forecast updates to proactively tackle unexpected contact volume changes. The forecasts adapt based on volume history taking into account your time zone, with regular intervals as frequent as every 30 minutes, enhancing intraday accuracy and mitigating the impacts of demand fluctuations.

The following diagram illustrates the reforecasting process:

Whenever WFM detects an anomaly, which can be an unexpected surge or drop in volume (when compared to the forecast), it will automatically trigger a reforecasting process, which will generate a new forecast for the affected queues.

The queues that are selected for intraday reforecast will have the forecast updated until the end of the current day, based on the account settings. The reforecasting process will also trigger an update to the metrics on the Team Schedule page.

Users with view permissions of the Forecast page, and with access to the affected queues (based on Ring Group Scoping configurations), will receive a notification upon reforecast triggering and also when it is completed. These notifications provide direct access to the Forecast page, filtered by the affected queues.

While a reforecast is in process, the Forecast, Team Schedule, and Insights pages will display an information message panel at the top. These panels also provide direct access to other relevant WFM pages, filtered by the affected queues.

Scheduling

To calculate the optimal or near-optimal schedule for the contact center, WFM needs the following information:

• Teams that have hours of operations (HOO), time zones, holidays, etc.
• Employees and their work rules (shift types and activities that can be scheduled).
• Staffing requirements (calculated from forecasts and goals).
• Any existing schedule including unavailability, meetings, time off, etc.
• Scheduling parameters.

Before scheduling, WFM checks the existing scenario for any issues. If there is a problem, an error is logged and, depending on the severity, the scheduling task is interrupted. If there is a problem with a specific queue, the queue is removed from the scheduling calculation.

The time period to schedule is configurable, and the schedules are calculated for the given period (one week at a time). Any schedules outside of this period are considered locked i.e., they are not modified by the scheduler.

Scheduling Considerations

To schedule each agent, WFM considers the following information, configuration and restrictions:

WFM performs the following steps during schedule calculation:

Simulation

The scheduler uses a Discrete Event Simulation (see DES) to figure out what the agents will be doing based on the current schedule. There are two primary reasons to run simulations:

1. The obvious one is to determine output statistics given the calculated schedules and forecasted workload (the predicted time series values, such as service level, occupancy, etc). It is not possible to determine accurate values for those metrics without simulation.
2. More subtly, simulation can be used mid-scheduling to tweak how WFM schedules. After placing some combination of shifts, WFM runs a simulation to see if the schedule is performing as well as we expected. If not, it is adjusted based on the output of the simulation. In the case of the current simulation, WFM uses the amount of time each agent spent on each queue to calculate the Skill Group Weights and then uses those when placing a shift.

Currently, WFM schedules one week at a time, with 3 scheduling passes each week. After each pass, a simulation is performed to adjust the SGWs. Each simulation consists of several simulation instances that are aggregated together. Due to the random nature of the events in the simulation, it may not be possible to get an accurate depiction of the contact center with just one simulation, e.g., if a few calls randomly bunch up early on, it may create a cascading effect that's hard to get past.

Interim vs Final Simulation

There are a few differences between the simulation used during scheduling and the final simulation used to generate the statistics:

• The arrival events for deferred queues in the interim simulations are generated from the staffing requirements, not the forecasted CVO. During scheduling, we are trying to place schedules that match the generated staffing requirements, which for deferred can be in a different interval than where the volume arrived. If the agents will be handling the deferred work later on and WFM is scheduling for that, it makes no sense to still have the volume being handled where it arrived in the simulation. So WFM simply generates it where it will be handled.
• For similar reasons, during the interim simulations, WFM abandons deferred work at the end of the interval it came in if it's not handled by the end of it. Since WFM generates just enough deferred staffing in each interval to be able to handle it all, if it is not possible to finish part of the work WFM needs to adjust its factors (e.g. SGWs) in that interval. WFM will not roll over the remaining deferred volume to the next interval.
• The interim simulations only need to simulate the period being scheduled, while the final simulation is performed for the entire simulation period.

Chat and SGW calculation

WFM is not splitting the skill groups up per different number of chats, e.g., agent with same skill C and one chat session will be in the same Skill Group as agent with skill C and five chat sessions. Doing so would potentially lead to a massive increase in the number of Skill Groups and decrease their usefulness. However, WFM can’t just use the same SGW for an agent who is only working on one chat as an agent who works 5.

This is addressed by:

• When calculating the SGWs, WFM adjusts each agent's contribution by their number of chats.
• When placing a shift, WFM adjusts each agent's contribution by their number of chats.

Editions

There are currently two schedule versions, "Draft" and "Release":

• The Draft schedule is a work in progress and what the Supervisor works within the Team Schedule screen.
• The Release schedule is the public schedule and what the Agent sees in the My Schedule screen.

Releasing a Schedule

• The release of a schedule is currently an operation that happens after forecasting and scheduling runs are complete and operates based on the configured account release window (there is not currently a UI for this but Talkdesk can make changes by account).
• The default account release window starts at the beginning of the week the current date falls in and goes for 6 weeks after that.
• Any time a schedule completes, the release process looks at the Draft Edition schedules within the release window, based on today’s date, and proceeds to run through logic to produce a Release Edition version of that schedule for Agents.
• The release process only considers Draft Edition schedules within the window so any Draft Edition schedules that exist beyond the window will not be released to the agents.

Additional Resources

Streamlined interface to configure rules-based proactive outbound messaging at scale. The Automated Notifications application allows you to create, edit, delete, and configure messages in a self-service way.  

Note: The enablement of Automation Notifications requires engagement with Talkdesk. 

The setup of several automated notifications based on events, allows you to proactively communicate every time an event is triggered, without needing an agent to be involved.

Above, you can find some examples of events and Automated Notifications (AN):

• Event: appointment
• AN: appointment confirmation request, appointment reminders, pre-appointment instructions
• Event: payment
• AN: payment reminders, payment confirmation
• Event: festival
• AN: ticket confirmation, festival day reminder, a message informing changes in the lineup

   

Accessing Automated Notifications

Once “Automated notifications” are enabled in your account, you will have access to this application inside the "Admin" application. 

The first step is to have a studio flow created to associate with your first Automated Notification.

Note: You can find more information here: 

• Healthcare Studio Component: Send SMS
• Healthcare Studio Component: Send SMS Notification with Reply

Creating an Automated Notification

To create a new Automated Notification, click on the Create automated notifications button [1], and fill in the following fields:

- “Name” [1]: This is the title of the message which will be visible to the recipients (e.g., an appointment reminder).
- “Studio flow” [2]: Contains the content of the messages to be sent.
- “Event” [3]: Only one event should be selected here. Note: Event creation requires engagement with Talkdesk.
- “Send” [4]: Choose to send the message either on the event date, before or after the event.
- “Repeats” [5]: Choose to send the message with a certain frequency, and if so, also decide when to stop sending it.
- “Preferences” [6]: Define the most suitable time and weekdays to send the notifications.

After all the mandatory fields are populated, click Save [7] and return to the “Automated notifications” page. Here, you will see a list of the automated notifications you have created.

When opening the page you will have access to the names you gave, the associated Talkdesk Studio™ flows, the time to send the notifications, know if there is a recurrence set, and the event the notification is associated with. 

Note: To learn how to send an Automated Notification through a Studio API flow, please check this article.

Editing and Deleting Automated Notifications

You can also edit [1] and/or delete [2] each automated notification created. To do so, click on the corresponding icon, displayed next to each notification. 

Related articles:

Healthcare Studio Component: Send SMS

Healthcare Studio Component: Send SMS Notification with Reply

Sending Automated Notifications via Studio API flow

Epic integration connects Talkdesk to patient information taken in real-time from Epic Systems EHR. It allows agents to quickly and efficiently access and manage critical information, including viewing patient history and medication details, previous contacts, and altering future appointments.

This integration is available for healthcare providers leveraging Epic Systems EHR and Talkdesk Healthcare Experience Cloud™. Setup and enablement are conducted by Talkdesk. Please reach out to us if you wish to begin using these capabilities. 

Other related articles

Healthcare Experience Cloud for Providers: Overview

Healthcare Experience Cloud for Providers™ is an end-to-end patient experience solution. It leverages Talkdesk’s extensive contact center assets and adds comprehensive healthcare-specific functionalities to provide the best result for patients and providers. 

This solution is available for healthcare provider organizations using Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems, offering integration solutions and custom integrations.

To enhance this experience and leverage a complete healthcare solution, our Healthcare Experience Cloud is composed by:

• Healthcare Provider Workspace that offers context, history, and information about the patient on a single page. 
• Pre-built workflows with effective self-service interactions with our Digital and Voice Autopilot. 
• Automated Notifications that reach patients through an outbound message with relevant and actionable information.

Note: The enablement of Healthcare Experience Cloud for Providers requires engagement with Talkdesk. 

Main Capabilities

Main capabilities of Healthcare Experience Cloud for Providers include:

• Healthcare Provider Workspace - "Patient 360"
• EHR Integrations
• Automation for Healthcare
• Autopilot for Healthcare
• Patient Omnichannel Interactions Report
• Automated Notifications
  
  

Healthcare Provider Workspace - "Patient 360"

This solution leverages Talkdesk Conversations and adds healthcare-specific capabilities through the Patient 360 application.

The Patient 360 app is a single pane of truth that offers a comprehensive and unified approach to managing patient information and interactions across various communication channels.

To enhance the data privacy measures, the Patient 360 also offers a dynamic pop-up layer that provides the agents crucial insights about the patient in question and gives a comprehensive understanding of the individuals who possess authorized access to the patient's data.

In addition to the cards, the agent can search and find different patient records that are immediately populated in Patient 360.

Patient 360 can be locked with a new layer of security, elevating Data Protection and Customer Experience. The "Related People" pop-up is an intuitive feature that empowers the agents to validate data access, ensuring it reaches only authorized individuals (only available for Cerner integration). 

EHR Integrations

The Healthcare Experience Cloud seamlessly integrates with EHR systems such as Epic, Cerner, Athenahealth, and a number of additional EHRs via Ellkay such as eClinicalWorks and NextGen. In addition to these options, it is also possible to create a custom integration through the HEC FHIR or Private API gateway. These integrations provide agents with access to patient information in real-time from EHR Systems.
This information includes medical details and future appointments. Furthermore, it empowers agents to modify appointments, finding available slots suited to each patient.

Automations for Healthcare

Healthcare organizations are constantly seeking ways to streamline operations and enhance the patient experience. At the forefront of innovation, our automation solutions are designed to simplify processes, reduce costs, and empower patients with self-service capabilities.

Talkdesk Agentless Payments for Epic

Talkdesk Agentless Payments for Epic, is a feature that allows patients to conveniently pay their outstanding bills through a secure IVR channel, eliminating the need for agent assistance. This solution is powered by Sycurio, a PCI-compliant partner, ensuring that all transactions meet stringent security standards.

Key benefits of Epic Agentless Payments:

• Seamless Patient Experience: Patients can pay bills quickly and effortlessly, 24/7.
• Enhanced Security: Transactions are handled securely by Sycurio, adhering to PCI compliance requirements.
• Operational Efficiency: Free up your contact center agents to focus on more complex, value-driven interactions.
• Cost Savings: Reduce operational overhead with automated payment processing.
• Real-time payment updates to Epic: Eliminate the need for manual reconciliation of payments made over the Talkdesk IVR.

Autopilot for Healthcare

Autopilot for Healthcare is a pre-built flow based on the most common healthcare use cases:  

• Patient Access:  to allow the patient to simply, and autonomously schedule a new appointment, confirm attendance at an appointment, cancel an appointment, or reschedule an appointment, among others.
• Patient Services: empower patients with seamless access to request a new prescription refill and effortlessly reset their MyChart passwords in a self-service way.

To provide an omnichannel experience, these virtual agents are available for Voice and Digital channels.

Patient Omnichannel Interactions Report

With this report, administrators in the Explore App can access the same information available in the Patient 360 workspace, to gain a deeper understanding of patients' communication habits. This includes details such as the number of phone numbers a patient has used to call and whether they have spoken on behalf of someone else. With this information, administrators can provide more personalized support to each patient, for an improved patient experience.

Automated Notifications

Automated Notifications is an application that gives the administrator the ability to configure their own messages by creating, editing, and deleting them seamlessly and autonomously. These messages can be shared agentless in real time, based on the associated events.

Related articles:

Healthcare Provider Workspace: Overview

Epic Integration: Overview

Automated Notifications: Overview

Talkdesk Healthcare Provider Workspace empowers agents to quickly access a patient’s information, and so provide them with expert and efficient care. It works mainly through the Patient 360 app.

Note: Talkdesk Healthcare Provider Workspace is available to healthcare providers using the Talkdesk Healthcare Experience Cloud for Providers™. Enablement and setup are all performed by Talkdesk.

When you have successfully gone through the installation and enablement process, you can proceed to set up the Patient 360 app. Make sure, first, that you have the Conversations app installed.

Managing the Patient 360 app

The Patient 360 app is installed by Talkdesk. You’ll be able to find the app in the My Apps section of Talkdesk main.

To manage users, follow these steps:

1. Go to My Apps and click on the settings icon [1] in the Patient 360 square to access the app’s management page. 

2. Click Users [2]. Select the users you wish to grant access to the app. 
3. Click Save Changes. 

To make full use of the Patient 360 app, you must first configure a Studio flow using Epic integration. Read our article Healthcare Use Case: Retrieving Patient Medical Records and Syncing with Talkdesk to learn how to do this.

For more information about the Healthcare Provider Workspace and the Patient 360 app, read Using Healthcare Provider Workspace.

Talkdesk Connections™ is Talkdesk’s solution to interact with, and leverage, data contained in any third-party system. It achieves this through custom actions, data pushes, and data dips to and from third-party APIs (Application Programming Interface), and complements the experience with the possibility of sending call-related information to the same third-party systems.

In addition, Connections enables you to quickly and autonomously add custom actions through a simple, no-code interface. This allows for more flexibility, control, and faster implementation of custom scenarios.

Available articles

Creating a Connection with Talkdesk Connections

Creating an Action with Talkdesk Connections

Creating an Automation with Talkdesk Connections

What is Talkdesk for Salesforce?

Talkdesk for Salesforce is Talkdesk’s managed package for Salesforce. It gives Salesforce users a more comprehensive call center experience by providing native access to a variety of Talkdesk features such as agent provisioning, real-time reporting, historical call reports and more.

Who can access Talkdesk for Salesforce?

Talkdesk for Salesforce leverages Salesforce triggers, custom fields, custom objects, and API calls. Talkdesk for Salesforce is available on select plans, with Standard User licenses (license type: Salesforce) on Salesforce and who are using the following editions of the CRM:

• Enterprise.
• Unlimited.
• Professional with API access.

Other types of Salesforce licenses, such as Community licenses, offer limited Salesforce access and therefore don’t allow the creation of Talkdesk for Salesforce users. For more information, please read User Licenses.

Where can I get Talkdesk for Salesforce?

Talkdesk for Salesforce is available for installation from the Salesforce AppExchange. Please note that full access to the app requires prior activation from Talkdesk. Follow the instructions in the article Installing Talkdesk for Salesforce.

How do I provision Talkdesk licenses for my Salesforce users?

Talkdesk for Salesforce licenses are separate from regular Talkdesk licenses. Once Talkdesk for Salesforce has been activated, reach out to us requesting the provisioning of new licenses. Please provide your Salesforce Production Organization ID and specify that you would like to add "Salesforce" licenses to your account.

What type of access does the Salesforce Admin installing Talkdesk for Salesforce need?

The user installing Talkdesk for Salesforce in your Salesforce instance must possess Salesforce Administrator access and/or the ability to create, update and delete AppExchange packages.

Does Talkdesk for Salesforce support Salesforce Lightning?

Yes. The Talkdesk app has been customized exclusively for the Lightning Experience. With the app, users have fast access to key Talkdesk features including Talkdesk Admin, live/historical reporting and the CTI. In addition, Talkdesk is fully compatible with Salesforce’s LockerService. LockerService enforces security restrictions on Lightning components to identify and prevent potential vulnerabilities. All of Talkdesk’s Lightning components have been validated and function as expected with LockerService enabled.

Talkdesk for Salesforce offers a streamlined deployment process that allows you to integrate Talkdesk with Salesforce, add Talkdesk licenses, and assign permission sets in just a few quick steps.

Before beginning the installation process, please take a moment to confirm the following:

• Salesforce edition: You have either an Enterprise, Unlimited or Professional with API access edition of Salesforce.
• Salesforce licenses: You need to have Salesforce licenses. For more information about license requirements, please read Talkdesk for Salesforce FAQ - New Customers.
• When to install: We recommend installing Talkdesk for Salesforce after hours, or during periods of lower call volume, as your agents will not be able to make or receive phone calls while Talkdesk for Salesforce is being installed.
• Salesforce Integration User licenses: The Salesforce Integration User License should not be used in Salesforce to integrate T4SF. The license will cause several problems, including Talkdesk activities not being created and contact and agent sync failing.

When you are ready, please follow the installation and configuration steps:

• Step 1: Download Talkdesk for Salesforce
• Step 2: Designate Integration Settings
• Step 3: Review Automations
• Step 4: Add Talkdesk Users
• Step 5: Finish
• Step 6: Click-to-Call and Other settings

Step 1: Download Talkdesk for Salesforce

• Locate the Talkdesk for Salesforce package on the Salesforce AppExchange and install it, by clicking Get It Now [1].
• Selecting Log In [2].
• Enter your login credentials for Salesforce [3].

Note: If you are already logged in to Salesforce, you will not be shown steps [2] and [3].

• Choose if you want to install the package in the production environment or in your sandbox account [4].
• Review the installation details and press Confirm and Install [5].
• Next, select the Salesforce profiles for which you would like to install Talkdesk for Salesforce and hit Install [6].

Note: We recommend you only install for System Administrators, as you will be able to grant specific users access to Talkdesk for Salesforce at a later step in the configuration process.

• In the pop-up window, check the box to approve third-party access for all Talkdesk websites [7]. This step ensures that Talkdesk has the necessary permissions to perform remote operations.

• After the installation has been completed, select the App Launcher section of Salesforce [8].
• Then, select Talkdesk Lightning from the list [9].
• Select the Talkdesk Admin tab [10] and click the Login to Talkdesk [11] button to log in to your Talkdesk account.

• Enter your Talkdesk account name and then your credentials [12].
• Next, create three Remote Site Settings [13].
• Next, create the Talkdesk Trusted URLs.

Step 2: Designate Integration Settings

On the following page, you can specify the type of objects that you want Talkdesk to sync [14]. Depending on your use case, you can select Contacts, Leads, or both.

You will also be able to select whether or not you would like Talkdesk calls to be logged in Salesforce [15]. Checking the box will automatically log all calls to the Talkdesk Activity object rather than the Standard Activity call object.

We recommend you keep this box checked so you can correlate call data with your other Salesforce data using Talkdesk for Salesforce’s reporting tools. In the next step, you can enable automations so you can continue logging calls to your Standard Activity call object.

TIP #1: Clicking on the gear icon next to “Logging” will reveal options for generating sample call data. This sample data will be randomly created and logged into your existing Salesforce records. We’ve included this option for our customers who may want to test out Talkdesk for Salesforce’s call reporting templates. You can remove this sample data without altering your real data at any time by returning to this page.

Finally, for example, you can also enable the features Auto Pop Up [16] and Relate to Opportunity or Case [17]. Press Save [18] when you’re done. 

There are other features present in this section that you can use. If you’d like to know more about how to configure these features, you can find them on the Talkdesk for Salesforce section of the Knowledge Base.

Note: If you'd like to synchronize deleted contacts and make sure contacts are deleted in Talkdesk when deleted from Salesforce, please make sure to follow these separate instructions.

Step 3: Review Automations

The next step of the configuration process is to review the list of automations currently configured for your call center [19]. On this page, you can enable or disable all available automations.

By default, Talkdesk includes 7 predefined automations with the installation package, but you may see more if your call center administrator has already set up additional automations.

We recommend enabling the automations “When an inbound/outbound disposition is set, log call.”

Although the Talkdesk Activity object will log all calls (including missed, abandoned calls, etc.), enabling these automations allows you to leverage the standard Salesforce Activity and Call Logging functionality. This ensures that agents can see interaction history on calls when looking at a contact/lead/case in Salesforce.

Step 4: Add Talkdesk Users

Important: Talkdesk will use the email to sync the agents; please ensure you have only one user per email. If multiple users are created under the same email (even if deactivated) the system may not sync to the correct Salesforce agent.

Adding users to Talkdesk for Salesforce is as simple as checking a box:

• Simply check the boxes next to the users you want to add to your call center and then hit the Add User button [20].
• A message will pop up asking you to assign your agents a role and a CTI [21]:
  • Select which type of role is to be assigned to those users and what you wish them to be using.

• Press the Add User button and then Save to proceed. Doing so will automatically:
  • Assign Salesforce Permission Sets to control access to Talkdesk components (admin settings, reporting, and others.).
  • Assign the selected Talkdesk for Salesforce CTI. In package versions before 5.0 the options will be the ones in the previous video, choose “Callbar CTI Eletron” to use the Conversations App. For versions after 5.0, “Callbar CTI Electron” option was substituted by “Talkdesk for Salesforce” call center.
  • Allocate the appropriate Talkdesk license
  • Assign the selected role in Talkdesk.

TIP #2: Roles in Talkdesk are equivalent to Permission Sets in Salesforce. For this reason, you can override Talkdesk’s default roles without leaving Salesforce by simply modifying Permission Sets. Learn more about Salesforce Permission Sets.

The following Talkdesk roles are available by default in Talkdesk for Salesforce:

• Agent/Custom Role - Maps to User Permission Set in Salesforce
• Supervisors - Maps to Manager Permission Set in Salesforce
• Administrators - Maps to Administrator Permission Set in Salesforce

For example, if you want your agents to be able to access the Talkdesk Live (legacy) dashboard, you need to manually assign them the Talkdesk Manager (or Administrator) Permission Set. The User Permission Set maps to the Agent role in Talkdesk, which by default does not provide access to Talkdesk Live (legacy) - only Supervisors and Admins have this access.

Also, standard users, by default will not be able to Auto Pop Salesforce Cases. To do this they must be manually assigned PushTopic Read permissions.

You can return to this page in Talkdesk Admin at any time, to add additional users or change roles for existing users.

Note: Adding new users in Salesforce will automatically add the user to your Talkdesk account, however, the opposite is not true. Please make sure to always add new users who will be using Salesforce directly in Salesforce, and not in the Talkdesk main web application.

Step 5: Finish

Hit Finish [22], and you’re done! You can visit these pages at any time to change your settings.

Step 6: Click-to-Call and Other Settings

Click-to-Call in Salesforce

The Talkdesk Click-to-Call Extension cannot be used within the same domain of Talkdesk’s connector. This means that it cannot be used in Salesforce as it will conflict with the connector and cause it to disconnect. Agents might have the Talkdesk Click-to-Call Extension installed; for it not to interfere with the Click-to-Call in Salesforce, please make sure they follow the instructions in the “Click-to-Call Extension” section of this troubleshooting article: “Please log in Salesforce Connector”.

Learn how to enable click-to-call for Cases in Salesforce.

Note: To be properly fetched and hyperlinked for use with Talkdesk Click-to-Call, phone numbers in Salesforce must be specified either in international, national formatting, or in the standard E.164 format, i.e., the plus sign (+), country code, area code, and number. If you need to provide a number in local national format, you should also specify the country as an optional parameter.

Talkdesk Explore™ is a Reporting tool that allows you more performance and flexibility to manage your historical data.

Explore is available within the Reporting section [1]. To access it, simply select the Explore tab [2].

Alternatively, you can access the Explore app [3] directly in Talkdesk Workspace™.

You will see several sets of Reports and Dashboards. All reports and dashboards are available from Explore's landing page. 

Note: The data freshness on Explore has a maximum delay of five minutes, meaning the data is never more than five minutes old.

Each one offers advanced filtering and search options so that you can quickly find the data that you are looking for:

• Dashboards.
• Reports.
• Accessing Dashboards and Reports.
• Custom Dashboards and Reports.
• Permissions.

Dashboards

A dashboard allows you to quickly check related metrics, based on the filters that you apply.

There are more than 15 default dashboards available in Explore:

• Agent Details.
• Agents.
• Agent Contacts' Volumes and Durations.
• Calls.
• Contacts' Service Level.
• Dispositions.
• Inbound.
• Inbound Contacts' Volumes and Durations.
• Number Details.
• Numbers.
• Outbound.
• Outbound Contacts' Volumes and Durations.
• Ring Attempts.
• Recent Activity Multichannel.
• Service Level.

Reports

A report displays the answer to a single data question, allowing you to view, export, and share more details about that data.

There are more than 30 default reports available in Explore:

• Accounts Breakdown Report.
• Activity Report.
• Agents Breakdown Report.
• Agents Inbound Dispositions Report.
• Agents Outbound Dispositions Report.
• Agents Report.
• Agents Status Report.
• Audit Logs Report.
• Calls Report.
• CSAT Messages Report.
• GDPR Status Report.
• Inbound Dispositions Report.
• Numbers Breakdown Report.
• Numbers Inbound Dispositions Report.
• Numbers Outbound Dispositions Report.
• Numbers Report.
• Outbound Dispositions Report.
• Studio Flow Execution Report.
• Tags Breakdown Report.
• Contacts’ Ring Groups Summary.
• Contacts’ Volume by day of the week.
• Contacts’ Volume by hour of the day.
• Ring Attempts Summary.
• Teams’ Contact Summary.
• Users’ Contact Summary.

Accessing Dashboards and Reports

To open a dashboard or a report, simply click on Default Dashboards or Default Reports. From the drop-down menu.

Besides this, you can quickly find dashboards and reports by:

• Searching for keywords.
• Selecting "Scheduled only" to view only reports and dashboards with a scheduled execution.

In the example below, we have narrowed down the visualization to show only the scheduled reports and Dashboards that contain the word “Calls”:

Custom Dashboards and Reports

Besides the default dashboards and reports described before, customers on one of Talkdesk's select plans are also able to create their own reports and dashboards. 

A Create button will be visible next to the search field at the top of the page. Once created, the custom dashboards and reports will be automatically placed in their corresponding section: "My Dashboards" or "My Reports".

For more details, please check the articles Custom Create Reports and Custom Create Dashboards.

Permissions

By default, users with the Admin or Supervisor role will have access to Explore.

If you wish to give access to other roles, or adjust the default permissions, you can do this from the Roles and Permissions tab of the Admin section. 

The available permissions for Explore are:

• View: permission to view Reports or a specific Dashboard.
• Manage: permission to create, edit, and delete Schedules.

For example, a custom or cloned role can be configured to have permission to see only specific dashboards.

To edit a role’s permissions, do the following:

1. After choosing the type of role you want to edit, select the Edit permissions option from the settings menu.

2. On the new window, you can select per “Ring Group” or “All”, and decide if those users can “Manage” or “View”.

3. When you’re done, hit Save, at the top of the page.

Notes:

• If you are the one who created a schedule, you will be the only user who can access the settings of that schedule. Conversely, you will not be able to configure the schedules that your colleagues set up. In order to be able to schedule and manage the schedules you've created, you need to have the Schedule “Update” permission ticked.
• Outbound tags (ring groups) for legacy are calculated as follows:

1. 1. Intersection of IVR Tags with Agent ring groups for Legacy IVR Ring groups.
   2. If the previous is not considered, then follows the intersection of phone ring groups with Agent ring groups.
   3. If the second is not considered, then the report uses the Phone Number ring groups.

For more information on how to configure role permissions, please check the article Team Roles.

Browse through the most frequently asked questions on Talkdesk Explore. For additional in-depth guidance, we recommend exploring the step-by-step articles on Talkdesk Explore and completing the Reporting & Analytics certification in Talkdesk Academy.

• Data and Permissions
  • How can I control user access to Explore?
  • What is Explore’s data retention period?
  • What happens to data when a phone number is deleted from my account?
  • Why can’t I see data before a specific date in reports?
• Dashboards and Reports
  • How do I create a report in Explore?
  • Can I create Explore reports with more than one dataset?
  • How many rows can be displayed on a report accessed in the Explore application?
  • Is there a limit to the number of rows in a report scheduled from Explore?
  • What is the start day of the week for Explore reports?
  • Can I export a spreadsheet with calls, notes, and dispositions?
  • Can I create a custom dashboard?
  • How many widgets can be used on a single Explore dashboard?
  • How fast can Explore run reports and dashboards?
  • What is the minimum refresh rate for Explore dashboards?
  • Is there a limit to the number of tiles that can be part of a custom dashboard in Explore?
• Metrics
  • How do I replicate the Metrics shown in Talkdesk Home Legacy in Talkdesk Explore?
  • Which dataset should you use to get more insights into an agent’s activity?
  • Why does an agent's time in the "On a Call" status doesn’t match the agent's handle time in “Contacts”?
  • Why are there some differences between the time metrics from a Calls report and the time metrics from a Contacts report? 
  • What is the difference between Ring Time, in the Contacts Report, and Speed to Answer, in the Calls Report?
  • Why do callbacks count at the Service Level?
  • Why are callbacks showing up as abandons in reporting?
  • What’s the difference between the Inside Service Level and the Within Service Level metrics?
  • Do pre-queue calls generate a contact for the contacts data model?
  • Why is the Ring Group null (blank) on my contacts report/dashboard?
  • Are short abandoned contacts included in the standard abandoned contacts and abandon rate metrics?
  • Why does the agent field show "If-No-Answer Agent" in a report?
  • Why does the agent field show "External Phone Number" in a report?
  • Why do deactivated/deleted agents still show up in report filters?
  • Why doesn't the Inbound Contacts report have a filter or a scope for Team?
  • If a Studio flow call is routed to an external number, does it create a new contact?
  • How are outbound tags for Classic Routing calculated?
  • How can I know how a call was routed using Explore reports?
  • What are possible hangup causes?
  • What are the differences between Waiting Time (WT), Average Speed of Answer (ASA,) and Average Agent Speed of Answer (AASA)? 
  • What are the reasons for reporting an agent's status as Deleted Status?
  • What are damaged calls?

Data and Permissions

How can I control user access to Explore?

To manage the users who have access to Explore, go to My Apps > Explore > Users. To configure the permissions for the different areas in Explore, including the “Create” feature (to create custom reports and dashboards), go to Roles and Permissions

What is Explore’s data retention period?

The setting Reporting Data Retention Period allows admins to define for how long Talkdesk should keep the account’s historical data. If the value is “1” (minimum value), we will show you the data for one day. If you don't set any value in the Reporting Data Retention Period you will have access to the historical data defined at the report/dashboard/dataset level. Check more information in our Data Dictionary and Developers Docs.

What happens to data when a phone number is deleted from my account?

Data from numbers that have been deleted from an account still exist for Explore reporting.

Why can’t I see data before a specific date in reports?

If the data is within the last 13 months, please review the data retention settings on your account.