When you have a group of individuals with similar job functions such as a support team, you may want incoming calls to ring through to the whole team to make sure that no call goes unanswered. You can do this with Ring Groups, a feature that lets you set up your system to ring multiple peoples’ phones from a single direct phone number or extension.

When someone calls the Ring Group’s phone number or reaches its extension, you can optionally play a Ring Group greeting. All phones or devices in the Ring Group will ring according to the pattern that you choose. If no one is available to answer, calls can be sent to a voicemail box, redirected to a specific extension, or sent to the next sublevel of a hybrid Ring Group setup.

A Ring Group differs from a Hunt Group in a few key ways. A Hunt Group uses ATA adapter hardware to ring the analog phones that are connected to it until it finds an open line. At that time, the Hunt Group releases the call and the extension’s call handling instructions are followed. A Ring Group, on the other hand, will keep ringing its users until the call connects. If the call times out, it will follow the Ring Group’s call handling instructions.

Ring Groups can ring members in two ways:

Simultaneous Ring

Simultaneous Ring rings all users or devices in the Ring Group at the same time until someone answers. This setup is perfect for teams such as a support group or an accounting group where all members are equally responsible for fielding incoming calls.

Sequential Ring

Sequential Ring rings users and devices one at a time in the order you specify until the call is answered. This setup is ideal for positions such as a receptionist, where a single person holds the primary responsibility for answering the phone with other individuals acting as backups. If the receptionist’s only device is an IP phone, the phone can be placed into Do Not Disturb mode to automatically forward calls to the backup receptionist or the Virtual Receptionist.

Hybrid

Hybrid Ring lets you take advantage of both Simultaneous and Sequential Ring. You can configure up to five Ring Group subgroups. When a call comes in, the first group will ring simultaneously. If no one answers after a predetermined amount of time, the Ring Group will move on sequentially to the next subgroup. A Hybrid subgroup is excellent for escalating calls to ensure they receive an answer. For example, the first subgroup may be all members of a sales team, followed by a receptionist, followed by support.

Choose a topic from the list below to learn more about Ring Groups:

Administrator

• How to add a new Ring Group
• How to add a Ring Group greeting
• How to add and remove members from a Ring Group
• How to manage a Ring Group’s phone number and extension
• How to configure a Ring Group’s options
• How to add a distinctive ringtone to a Ring Group
• How to prepend the Ring Group name to incoming caller-ID
• How to delete a Ring Group