Human backup

A caller can ask for a person at any point in any call, and the assistant always obliges. The human backup plan says what "a person" means for each community: who is reachable, when, and what happens when nobody picks up.

What the assistant does#

flowchart TD
  need[Caller needs a person] --> hours{Inside this community's<br/>staffed hours?}
  hours -- no --> cb[Take a callback]
  hours -- yes --> num{A backup number set?}
  num -- no --> cb
  num -- yes --> t1[Ring the backup number]
  t1 -- answered --> done([Call passed over])
  t1 -- no answer --> t2[Ring the second contact]
  t2 -- answered --> done
  t2 -- no answer --> cb
  cb --> notify[Email the people you named,<br/>with a link to the call]
  notify --> due[Callback due within your target time]
  due --> late{Marked done in time?}
  late -- no --> esc([Account admins told])

A callback taken outside staffed hours is due from the start of the next staffed window, so a Saturday evening callback is due on Monday morning rather than overnight. The community's holidays and closures count as unstaffed, so a Christmas Day caller gets a callback, due when the community reopens.

When a handoff happens#

Fill in the plan#

1. Open the community's Human backup tab

   Go to Communities, open one, and choose Human backup. A banner at the top tells you either what is still missing or that the plan is complete.

   

2. Set staffed hours

   Under Staffed hours, add one row per pattern: the days, a start time and an end time. Times are in the community's own time zone, which you set under the community's Details. Tick Until midnight for hours that run to the end of the day.

   Leave staffed hours empty and the assistant never transfers: it always takes a callback instead. That is a valid choice if your team prefers callbacks, and the page says so plainly.

3. Say who takes transfers

   Field	What to put
   Backup number	The number the assistant rings first. International format, for example +15555550123.
   Second contact (optional)	Tried when the first number does not answer.
   Wait for an answer	How long to ring before trying the next contact. 25 seconds by default.
   Ring a ring group instead (optional)	Rings one of the community's ring groups instead of the numbers above, for Wait for an answer (10 to 60 seconds). The numbers stay saved and are rung only when the ring group cannot ring, such as on a test call.

   Note

   If something goes wrong. A number in the wrong format is refused as you type: it needs the country code and no spaces or brackets.

4. Say who hears about callbacks

   Field	What to put
   Email these people	Type an address and press Enter. At least one is required.
   Text these numbers	Type a number and press Enter.
   Call back	How quickly a callback should be returned: 15 minutes up to 2 business days.

   Notifications carry the caller's name and number, the reason, and a link to the call. They do not carry what was said. The details stay in the app, behind your team's sign-in.

   Note

   Every notification is emailed. It is texted as well, to the numbers you list here, once your account has a registered sending number: ask us to set one up. Email stays the record, so a text that fails to send never loses a callback.

5. Adjust what the assistant says, if you want to

   While transferring and When no one is available are optional here. Leave them empty and every community uses the playbook's lines. Fill them in to give one community its own wording.

6. Save

   Press Save to unpublished changes. The button stays disabled while anything required is missing, and the banner names it. When the plan is complete you get: This plan is complete. Callers can always reach a person or leave a callback.

7. Publish

   The plan saves to the community's unpublished changes, with anything else changed on the community since the last publish. Press Publish on the Unpublished changes bar to make it live; until then calls use the plan as it was. You can press Test call first to hear it. See Test and publish a community's changes.

What good looks like#

• The green banner at the top of the tab, not the amber one.
• Communities shows Complete in the Human backup column for every community.
• The people on the email list know they are on it, and know what the target callback time is.

The two rules that block publishing#

When you publish an account playbook, a community whose plan is incomplete is simply skipped: it keeps running its current version, and the publish result tells you which communities were held back and why.

Watching it work#

The Callbacks tab under Calls lists every callback the assistant captured, when it is due, and whether it is overdue. Mark each one done as your team returns it. Closing its commitment or task on Today or in My tasks closes it as well, as done or as dismissed.

The Calls part of the Insights Scorecard (call metrics) tracks how often each community is needed and how often its transfers are answered.

Limits worth knowing#

• Introducing the caller needs an outbound line. The playbook's How to transfer setting offers "Introduce the caller to the person first". When it is on, the caller waits on hold, the assistant rings your backup number, says who is calling and why, and connects the two only once your colleague says yes. That last part matters: a number that rolls to voicemail never says yes, so the caller is not handed to an answering machine and the transfer is counted as unanswered. It needs an outbound calling line on our side; until that is set up, the setting falls back to passing the call straight through, and the call record says so.
• Transfers need staffed hours. Outside them, no number is rung at all.
• A refused call is a failed transfer. When your phone system rejects the call outright (SIP 607 Unwanted or 608 Rejected), the transfer counts as failed rather than unanswered. The assistant still tries the second contact, then takes a callback.
• One chain per community. The assistant tries the backup number, then the second contact, then takes a callback. There is no longer chain than that.