Monday 13 April 2020

Microsoft Teams basic Call Centre dashboard

      As of today, the Microsoft Calling API is not yet available meaning a call centre dashboard is not possible, making it a roadblock for any small and medium businesses. In the wake of the Corona virus a business found itself in a delicate situation where working from home was a necessity but it's call centre was stuck on an old on-prem queue system. Business however placed workers health above dashboards and went ahead with Microsoft Teams, at least temporarily to allow working from home.

It's super easy to setup a call centre with Microsoft phone number or an SBC provider 



How to do it? 

Using PowerShell Universal dashboard (https://universaldashboard.io/) we can use the existing Skype Online commandlets and build a dashboard.

First you will need to create a script to pull the data for each queue.


[Create a secure string to host your password - this is the easy way to get around storing the credentials. How to: https://www.pdq.com/blog/secure-password-with-powershell-encrypting-credentials-part-1/]

$pass = cat C:\temp\Password.txt | ConvertTo-SecureString -Force
$mycred = New-Object -TypeName System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -ArgumentList "teams.dashboard@XXXXX.XXXX",$pass

[Now let's connect to "Cloud"]
$sfbsession = New-CsOnlineSession -Credential $mycred
Import-PSSession $sfbsession -AllowClobber -verbose:$false | Out-Null
            $custservice = Get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Statistics | Select-Object -ExpandProperty StatValue
            $commercial= Get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Statistics | Select-Object -ExpandProperty StatValue
            $sales = Get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Statistics | Select-Object -ExpandProperty StatValue
            


[Store all the above information in a temporary TXT file]
            $data = {
            "Customer service queue size:"
            Write-Output -InputObject $custservice
            "Commercial queue size:"
            Write-Output -InputObject $commercial
            "Sales queue size:"
            Write-Output -InputObject $sales
            } 

            & $data | Out-File c:\temp\data.txt


[This part is optional. This is to display in the dashboard which agent is Opt In or Opt out of taking calls]
            
            (get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx).agents | select @{name="Agent";Expression={Get-CsOnlineUser -Identity $_.objectid | select -expandproperty displayname}}, optin | Export-Csv c:\temp\csagents.csv
            
            (get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx).agents | select @{name="Agent";Expression={Get-CsOnlineUser -Identity $_.objectid | select -expandproperty displayname}}, optin | Export-Csv c:\temp\coagents.csv
            
            (get-CsCallQueue -Identity xxxIDENTITY ID OF QUEUExxx).agents | select @{name="Agent";Expression={Get-CsOnlineUser -Identity $_.objectid | select -expandproperty displayname}}, optin | Export-Csv c:\temp\saagents.csv



[This is also optional. I set this up to make sure the queue is refreshing for moments when there are 0 calls in queue for a long time. To ensure dash is not hung]


            $debugnumber = Get-Random  -Minimum 1 -Maximum 20 
            $debugfile = {
            "Random debug number:"
            Write-Output -InputObject $debugnumber
            }
            & $debugfile | Out-File c:\temp\debug.txt

[This is needed because this being a repetitive task it will error out for too many sessions per user]
            Remove-PSSession $sfbsession


Set up the above to run as a start-up triggered Scheduled Task in Windows with a repetition interval of 2 minutes. Don't set it to lower as the above pull takes apx.1.5 minutes to complete.


To create the dashboard is super easy and to make it even easier here is the code to make it happen for you (there are three queues in this. You can add or remove as you please). Make sure you install the Universal Dashboard component first:


$theme = Get-UDTheme -Name 'Azure'


New-UDDashboard -Title "Teams Call Centre Statistics" -Theme $theme -Content{
New-UDRow -Columns{


New-UDColumn -Size 4 {

New-UdMonitor -Title "Customer Service Waiting Calls" -Type Line -DataPointHistory 30 -RefreshInterval 90 -ChartBackgroundColor '#2E8B57' -ChartBorderColor '#FFFF6B63'  -Endpoint {
            try {
                $text = Get-Content -Path C:\temp\data.txt
                [int]$text[1] | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
            catch {
                0 | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
        }
}

New-UDColumn -Size 4 {

New-UdMonitor -Title "Commercial Waiting Calls" -Type Line -DataPointHistory 30 -RefreshInterval 90 -ChartBackgroundColor '#ffffff' -ChartBorderColor '#FFFF6B63'  -Endpoint {
            try {
                $text = Get-Content -Path C:\temp\data.txt
                [int]$text[3] | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
            catch {
                0 | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
        }

}

New-UDColumn -Size 4 {

New-UdMonitor -Title "Sales Waiting Calls" -Type Line -DataPointHistory 30 -RefreshInterval 90 -ChartBackgroundColor '#FF8C00' -ChartBorderColor '#FFFF6B63'  -Endpoint {
            try {
                $text = Get-Content -Path C:\temp\data.txt
                [int]$text[5] | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
            catch {
                0 | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
        }
}
}



New-UDRow {
            
            New-UDColumn -size 4 {
                New-UDGrid -Title "Customer Service" -RefreshInterval 90 -Endpoint {
                   Import-Csv -Path C:\temp\csagents.csv | Out-UDGridData
                }
            }

            New-UDColumn -size 4 {
                New-UDGrid -Title "Commercial Service" -RefreshInterval 90 -Endpoint {
                   Import-Csv -Path C:\temp\coagents.csv | Out-UDGridData
                }
            }

            New-UDColumn -size 4 {
                New-UDGrid -Title "Sales Service" -RefreshInterval 90 -Endpoint {
                   Import-Csv -Path C:\temp\saagents.csv | Out-UDGridData
                }
            }

}


New-UDRow -Columns{


New-UDColumn -Size 4 {

New-UdMonitor -Title "Debug Graph" -Type Line -DataPointHistory 30 -RefreshInterval 90 -ChartBackgroundColor '#2E8B57' -ChartBorderColor '#FFFF6B63'  -Endpoint {
            try {
                $text = Get-Content -Path C:\temp\debug.txt
                [int]$text[1] | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
            catch {
                0 | Out-UDMonitorData
            }
        }


}

}
}


 To start the dashboard you need to create a third script:

Import-Module UniversalDashboard
Start-UDDashboard -Port 1000 -FilePath "C:\temp\dash.ps1" -AutoReload




I have setup the above also as a start-up task in Windows. All the above should result in this:




This should keep any small business happy. Enjoy!

Sunday 22 March 2020

Business continuity is key


[Read time: 2min]

     Not a single business can say it's not in some shape or form affected by the recent pandemic. An estimated 160K jobs will be lost in Ireland only, with inevitable recession at the end of 2020 and into 2021. This is just the beginning they say, it could take months or up to a year to recover and worse there could be a second or third wave.

Most businesses have no disaster recovery plan to mitigate a situation where offices need to be close, not just for a pandemic, could be fire, flood damage, earthquake's, any act of God etc. Reason why a business must have continuity plan. How? 

The main reason a business closes is the fact employees can't get to work. Any office no matter how big or small can work from home these days. If you are part of the 99% unprepared here is the simple solution to get your business back working in one day


Get remote access to your business applications and forward your on-premise telephony to Microsoft Teams (a modern cloud based telephony solution with no up-front cost). We can set this up for you in just one day!

Not only does your business get back on track but it has upgraded its infrastructure with almost zero capital investment with the added modern day security. Citrix is used by almost all major market players and proven to be the best in class:


Citrix products are claimed to be in use by over 400,000 clients worldwide, including 99% of the Fortune 100, and 98% of the Fortune 500. (Wikipedia)


Sounds too good? Your business can trial a cloud desktop today for free. Computer skills don't matter as Citrix is built in such a way to fit every type of office worker.

www.itvolks.ie

Friday 14 February 2020

Reduce telephony costs by 80% with Microsoft Teams

Recently we took on an adventure with an enthusiastic customer to improve their telephony from and old expensive legacy hardware to a new modern and future-proof solution. First things first I want to quickly describe the current scenario.

60 employees using an old NEC SIP unit solution hooked onto PSTN. I haven't even bothered to investigate it further. (installed around 2007)



Out of the 60 employees 15 are call-centre answering on average 600 sales calls.
Users use old deskphones and a call centre agent software which requires .NET framework 2.0 and Windows 7 (another reason customer wanted to move away with support for Windows 7 now gone)

The solution: 

Microsoft Teams using an SBC from a BT re-seller. We found that calling rates are on average 60-70% cheaper than the existing PSTN. So it was a no brainer to start testing it. We got everyone Plantronics Skype/Teams qualified headsets and as simple as deploying the Teams client.

For the call centre solution we have picked "MIDA". An extreamly cheap solution with features you would only expect from a 50K+ solution. Contact a MIDA partner and you will be amazed how cheap the solution is. (https://www.midasolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/MidaSolutions_LiteCallCenter_Datasheet_EN.pdf)

Initial testing is positive and call quality is better in fact then PSTN. We haven't got to the stage of setting up DSCP marking and traffic prioritisation on voice but even so the quality is amazing.

Solution took two days to deploy! If you ping me in private I will tell you who to contact and pricing.


Will keep you all posted next week how the testing goes and will publish the QoE stats.



Have a great one!
Daniel