On a shared server, trunks are assigned and numbers are handed out, never typed. Plus one list of every account.
Putting several businesses on one server raised a question we had not had to answer before: when a call comes in, whose is it? A day of testing with a second business on our own server gave us the answer, and a few things to tidy.
Trunks belong to the server
A trunk used to belong to whichever business it was made under. Now it belongs to the server, and whoever looks after the server assigns it to the businesses that should use it.
- A business dials out through an assigned trunk under its own caller ID.
- It never sees the trunk's account or password.
- A trunk cannot be taken back while a business still has numbers or rules on it. The page says which.
Numbers are handed out, not typed
This is the part that matters. If anyone could type in a number and claim its calls, one customer could take another's.
So each trunk now has a list of its numbers. Type them in, or bring them in from a file. Whoever looks after the server gives each number to a business, and on its own pages that business picks from the numbers it was given. Several can be set up at once.
| Who | What they do |
|---|---|
| The server's administrator | Adds numbers to a trunk and gives each to a business |
| A business's administrator | Chooses where each of its numbers goes |
| Anybody else | Cannot claim a number at all |
Fax lines and text numbers are chosen the same way.
One list of every number
Each business has a Numbers page: every number it has, and the person, group, queue or menu it reaches. The ones not set up yet say so.
One list of every account
Whoever looks after the server can see everyone who signs in, whichever business they are in, and lock an account, unlock it, set a new password or sign someone out everywhere.
The honest part
All of this is in testing, on our own server, with our own second business. Testing it found real faults, which is what testing is for, and they are fixed. In production, each customer still has an install of their own.