Creating an Agent Group
Topic Last Modified: 2009-05-22
When you create an agent group, you select the agents that are assigned to the group and specify additional group settings, such as the routing method and whether an agent can sign in to and out of the group.
An agent who must sign in and out of the group, which is different from signing in or out of Office Communications Server, is called a formal agent. Formal agents must be signed in to the group before they can receive calls routed to the group. This can be useful for agents who answer calls from the group on a part-time basis. Formal agents sign in and out of their groups using an Office Communicator custom tab. For details about the custom tab, see Configuring the Response Group Tab in the Deploying the Response Group Service documentation.
An agent who does not sign in or out of the group is called an informal agent. Informal agents are automatically signed in to the group when they sign in to Office Communications Server.
To create an agent group
On a computer where the Office Communications Server administrative tools are installed, log on as a member of the RTCUniversalServerAdmins group.
Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
Right-click the name of the server pool, point to Properties, point to Applications, and then click Response Group Service Properties.
In the Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Response Group Administration snap-in, expand the pool node, right-click Groups, and then click New group.
On the General tab, in the Name box, type a name for the group.
Click the Policies tab.
Under Agent participation policy, do one of the following to set up the sign-in behavior for the group:
- To specify that agents in the group cannot sign in and out of the group, click Informal. Agents are automatically signed in to the group when they sign in to Office Communications Server.
- To specify that agents in the group must sign in and out of the group, click Formal. When you select this option, agents sign in and out of the group using an Office Communicator custom tab. For details about the custom tab, see Configuring the Response Group Tab in the Deploying the Response Group Service documentation.
- To specify that calls cannot be routed to this agent group, click Not active.
In the Agent alert time (seconds) box, specify how long to ring an agent before offering the call to the next available agent (the default is 20 seconds).
Under Routing method, specify how calls are routed to agents in the group as follows:
- To offer a new call first to the agent who has been idle the longest, click Longest idle.
- To offer a new call to all available agents at the same time, click Parallel. The call is sent to the first agent who accepts it.
- To offer a new call to each agent in turn, click Round robin.
- To always offer a new call to the agents in the order in which they are listed on the Agents tab, click Serial.
On the Agents tab, specify how you want to create your agents list:
To use a Microsoft Exchange Server distribution list, click Use an existing email distribution list, and then type the e-mail address of the distribution list (for example, NetworkSupport@contoso.com).
Note
If you use an e-mail distribution list, you are subject to the following constraints:
- You cannot select multiple distribution lists for the agent group. Each group supports only a single distribution list.
- If the distribution list contains one or more distribution lists, members of the nested distribution lists are not added to the agent list.
- If serial and round robin routing are selected, the server offers an incoming call to the appropriate agent according to the routing method and according to the order in which agents are listed on the Agents tab of the Response Group Service pool-level properties.
- You cannot select multiple distribution lists for the agent group. Each group supports only a single distribution list.
To use a custom list of agents, click Define a custom group of agents. In the Available Agents box, select one or more agents from the list, and then click Add.
Note
If the group is using either round robin or serial routing, on the Agents tab, arrange the agents in the order that you want them to be offered calls. To change the order of the agents in the list, in the Agents assigned box, click an agent, and then click the up arrow or down arrow button.
Click OK.