Overview of Telephone Notification Workflow

When you print circulation notices, the system creates a list of the hold pickup and overdue notices that can be delivered by the i-tiva or Teleforms telephone notification programs. When you choose to have these notices delivered by telephone notification, the system automatically sends them to a SQL database on the Innovative server using Open Database Connectivity (ODBC). Your telephone notification program accesses the same database so that you do not need to manually download or upload the notices. You can configure your telephone notification program so that it automatically begins placing these calls at the appropriate hour.

Who is Eligible to Receive Telephone Notification Notices

By default, all patrons whose records have a valid telephone number in the TELEPHONE or TELEPHONE2 variable-length field in their patron record are eligible to receive telephone notification notices. A valid telephone number contains only digits and punctuation, but no notes. For example:

Valid numbers:

(510) 555-1234
800-555-9876

Invalid numbers:

(510) 555-1234 [work number]
800-555-9876 call after 2pm

Notes must be entered in a separate note field.

To block a patron from receiving telephone notification notices at a number listed in the TELEPHONE or TELEPHONE2 field, insert ## (<pound><pound>) in the field whose number you want to block. To block the numbers in both fields, insert ## in both fields. The system will always print or email (if your library has the Sending Circulation Notices via Email feature enabled) notices for patrons for whom ## has been specified.

Telephone notification notices can have one of the following statuses:

Status Description
Ready The call is ready to be placed.
Pending The telephone notification program is currently placing the call, or at least one attempt to place the call has been made.
Complete The telephone notification program successfully placed the call.
Incomplete The telephone notification program could not successfully place the call. The telephone notification program will not attempt to place this call again.
Incompletelogged The telephone notification program could not successfully place the call and a notice has been printed. Calls with this status remain in the telephone notification program History database for the number of days determined by the View Teleforms History circulation option setting.

The telephone notification program automatically updates the status of each notice in the database. However, every day your library is open, you should print unsuccessful telephone notification notices. When you choose to print unsuccessful telephone notification notices, the telephone notification program removes completed calls (i.e., those calls whose status is "Complete") from the database and allows you to print those calls that it could not complete (i.e., those whose status is "Incomplete"). If you confirm that you successfully printed the incomplete calls, the telephone notification program removes them from the database. (Note that the Teleforms_D software does not remove data from the database.) Calls with a status of "Ready" or "Pending" remain in the database until the telephone notification program changes their status to "Complete" or "Incomplete".

Printing Charges for Telephone Notification Notices

Note that if your library has enabled charges for printing overdue notices, these printing charges only apply to patrons who have chosen printed notices as their primary means of notification.

Patrons who prefer to receive overdue notices by telephone notification (as specified in the patron records) are not subject to this charge -- even if the system has automatically placed unsuccessful telephone notification notices in the print queue, and even if you have chosen to print overdue notices.

A Typical Call

For each call that it places, the telephone notification program begins by taking the telephone line off-hook and listening for a dial tone. After it recognizes the dial tone, it dials the number. You can use the configuration options and dialing rules to specify whether the telephone notification program includes prefixes, area codes, or suffixes.

The telephone notification program can recognize most standard sounds on a phone line, such as ringing and a busy signal. If it recognizes a ringing line with no answer, or a busy signal, the telephone notification program skips to the next call in the list. If it recognizes a voice on the line (either a live human voice or a recording), it waits for the voice to stop speaking, and then delivers the appropriate message. For example:

Hold Pickup Message

Hello. This is the Springfield Public Library. A book that a patron at this number requested is now available for pickup. It will be held at the library until Friday, January 5th. Please come in and pick up this item. To repeat this message, please stay on the line...

Overdue Message

Hello. This is Springfield Public Library. Our records indicate that a patron at this number has some books that are overdue. If so, please return them to the library. To repeat this message, stay on the line...

Acquiring Additional Hold Pickup Messages for Teleforms

By default, the Teleforms computer supports one hold pickup message and one overdue message only. However, your library can acquire additional hold pickup messages. For more information, see Specifying TNS Hold Pickup Locations.

The first time the telephone notification program attempts to place the call, it changes the call's status from "Ready" to "Pending". If the telephone notification program is able to play the message, the call is considered delivered and the telephone notification program changes its status to "Complete". If the telephone notification program is unable to play the message, it checks the setting of the AttemptLimit configuration option. If the AttemptLimit option is set to a value greater than '1', the call's status remains "Pending". When the telephone notification program reaches the AttemptLimit for the call, the call is considered undelivered and the telephone notification program changes the call's status to "Incomplete".

In either case, after attempting to place the call, the telephone notification program hangs up the phone line and proceeds to the next call in the list. This process continues until all of the calls in the list have been attempted. At this point, the telephone notification program reattempts to place calls that have a status of "Pending". If you prepare more telephone notification notices, the telephone notification program appends those notices to the list.

The telephone notification program prioritizes calls in the list using the following logic. In this order, it sorts the calls by:

  1. The number of attempts made (fewest attempts first).
  2. How recently the last attempt was made (most recent last).
  3. Phone number.

If an answering machine answers a call, the telephone notification program waits for the completion of the recorded greeting before playing the message. If the answering machine has a long pause between the end of its recorded message and the beep, signifying that it is ready to record, it is possible that the first part of the telephone notification program's message will not be recorded. However, you can configure the telephone notification program to repeat messages so that the answering machine can record the entire message when it repeats.