Telephone activities are very common in business whether they are outbound as in our example or inbound. In our example we had added and activity for ourselves two days in advance and once the moment arrives to make the call we use the ToDo list to move to the correct contact record and press D (for Dial) to work with the activity with F9 to record the text of the telephone call. Later, pressing H (for Hangup) results in the completion of the activity plus the recording of two important pieces of information, duration and result.
The use of keys D and H are the basis of one of our most important automatic activities, recording telephone calls by using a shortcut for telephone activities whether or not they are Outbound or Inbound.
The shortcut works on any highlighted activity as we saw in our example and also with any contact record without an existing telephone activity. This is how it works. GoTo the contact record where you would like to start the telephone call. In this case we are detailing Outbound telephone calls only, and follow these steps:
|
Key; |
Value: |
What happens: |
|
D |
Dial |
If you are NOT already on a pending TELE O activity it will create one for you with an INPROG status. The timer will be started. |
|
F9 |
Extend a note |
A screen appears so that you can type an activity note. If a note already existed than a new date and time stamp is created for your use. Press enter when you are finished with the typing of your activity note and the activity note will be saved on the contact record under the INPROG activity bar |
|
H |
Hangup |
The activity will be completed automatically, the timer will be stopped and the data entered into a field specially setup to record duration, a prompt will occur to allow you to type data to express the result of the call, ie SLS, SVC, etc. |
To record an incoming call, pickup the telephone and answer it. Once you have determined to whom you are speaking and that you wish to record the incoming telephone call, simply use GoTo to find the correct contact record (or create a new one in an existing PID group). Once you have positioned yourself on desired contact record follow these steps:
|
Key; |
Value: |
What happens: |
|
T |
Take |
If you are NOT already on a pending TELE I activity it will create one for you with an INPROG status. The timer will be started. |
|
F9 |
Extend a note |
A screen appears so that you can type an activity note. If a note already existed than a new date and time stamp is created for your use. Press enter when you are finished with the typing of your activity note and the activity note will be saved on the contact record under the INPROG activity bar |
|
H |
Hangup |
The activity will be completed automatically, the timer will be stopped and the data entered into a field specially setup to record duration, a prompt will occur to allow you to type data to express the result of the call, ie SLS, SVC, etc. |
To summarize, one of ActionWare's most valuable automatic activities is shortcut key values to record telephone calls. Pressing D (Dial) will record an outgoing telephone activity and pressing T (Take) will record an incoming telephone activity. Using F9 after either single key shortcut will allow you to type an activity note. Using the shortcut key H (Hangup) will result in completing the activity. Use of the shortcut keys requires setup in our Master Controls options by your System Administrator.
The other automatic activity in ActionWare does not even require a shortcut key. As a result of creating a Microsoft Word document in ActionWare by using our Microsoft Word Interface (MSWI) programs an automatic activity bar is created when you start your document and completed when the document is closed. The MSWI programs require setup by your System Administrator.