Distributing calls over serving centers of a large customer
First Claim
1. A method of serving calls to a customer having a plurality of call distributor (CD) serving centers, comprising the steps of:
- receiving, in a first of said centers a call rerouted from a second of said centers;
determining whether an excessive number of calls have been previously rerouted to said first center from an alternate center other than said second center, said excessive number indicating inability to handle additional calls without unacceptable delay in said alternate center, andif an excessive number of calls has not been rerouted from said alternate center, rerouting said call to said alternate center;
wherein overflow calls are automatically rerouted to an alternate center which is not likely to be overloaded without requiring any call routing control messages, reflecting a level of busyness of a serving center, to be transmitted among said plurality of serving centers.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
This invention relates to apparatus and methods for sharing traffic among a plurality of ACD sites serving a customer. Each ACD site has a main queue for storing incoming calls to that ACD, and a group of overflow queues for storing calls rerouted from one of the other ACD sites. Before rerouting a call to an alternate site, the overflow queue for that site is checked; if it has an excessive number of entries, calls will not be rerouted to that alternate site. If one of the ACD sites is not appropriately equipped with overflow queues for different sites and an appropriate program for steering calls, that ACD site can route its overflow traffic via one of the ACD sites, designated as a mother node, for distributing overflow from the one site to others.
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Citations
16 Claims
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1. A method of serving calls to a customer having a plurality of call distributor (CD) serving centers, comprising the steps of:
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receiving, in a first of said centers a call rerouted from a second of said centers; determining whether an excessive number of calls have been previously rerouted to said first center from an alternate center other than said second center, said excessive number indicating inability to handle additional calls without unacceptable delay in said alternate center, and if an excessive number of calls has not been rerouted from said alternate center, rerouting said call to said alternate center; wherein overflow calls are automatically rerouted to an alternate center which is not likely to be overloaded without requiring any call routing control messages, reflecting a level of busyness of a serving center, to be transmitted among said plurality of serving centers. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A first call distributor (CD) comprising:
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queue means for storing calls rerouted into said first CD from a group of other alternate CDs; means responsive to receipt of a call overflowed from a second CD, said second CD not in said group, for examining said queue means to identify one of said alternate CDs which has overflowed relatively few calls to said first CD, said relatively few calls indicating ability to handle additional calls without excessive delay in said one of said alternate centers; and means responsive to said examining means identifying one of said alternate CDs for rerouting said call to the identified CD; wherein overflow calls are automatically rerouted to an alternate CD which is not likely to be overloaded without requiring any call routing control messages, reflecting a level of busyness of a CD, to be transmitted among said first CD and said group of other alternate CDs. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
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Specification