The Calling Rules settings allow you to define specific calling rules for a telephone interviewing project.

You can configure settings for:

The Parameters settings allow you to specify the amount of time to wait before re-dialing numbers that are busy, unanswered, or answered by an answering machine.

You set these parameters at the start of the project, and can change them throughout the interviewing period to match the current requirements of the survey. For example, if it is the last day of the survey and you are running low on new participants, you might want to increase the maximum number of times that numbers can be called. You might also want to reduce the elapse times for automatically set appointments so that numbers with callbacks become available for recall more quickly.

The table allows you to define the amount of time to wait before attempting to re-dial samples that meet a specific criteria (no answer, busy, and so on). Enter appropriate values (in minutes) for each call category.

When selected, the interviewer who arranged the appointment is given preference over other available interviewers (as it applies to scheduling when samples can be retried). If the project uses group/predictive autodialing, the interviewer will not be connected automatically to the participant who has an appointment. Instead, the participant's details are displayed on the interviewer's screen, and the interviewer must then click the Start Dialing button to dial the participant's phone number.

When selected, any available interviewer is allowed to retry the sample, regardless of who arranged the appointment. This is the default setting.

The number of minutes before the recall time that a number with an automatic appointment can be called. The default is ten minutes.

The time zones in which participants are located. The values that you enter in this field must be the indexes of the time zones in the list of time zones stored in the registry. If more than one time zone is specified, the numbers must be separated by semicolons. If this property is blank, UNICOM Intelligence Interviewer - Server Admin ignores time zone and calling times when selecting records for interviewers to call.

When selected, calls are assigned to interviewers based on interviewer qualifications. For example, if the participant's native language is Spanish, then assign the call to a Spanish speaking interviewer.

The Ordering settings allow you to specify the order in which records are retrieved from each individual queue. For example, you might want to first dial records with a higher number of attempts when scanning the Recall queue.

The table defines the ordering of records, by field, in each queue. Select the field order from the Field menus.

Allows you to specify the frequency in which recalls to busy and other unanswered calls take priority over calls to new numbers. Specify a percentage to check the RECALL queue before the FRESH queue. For example, specifying a value of 25% would result in the RECALL queue being checked before the FRESH queue for one-in-four calls. The default value is 90%.

The table displays the current field order for each queue and provides options for defining which sample fields are used for ordering the queue records, adding new queue order rules, and deleting queue order rules.

The Call Times settings specify the project's valid participant call times and day parts. Day parts ensure that records are called at specific times of the day, to increase the chance of reaching participants.

If you have an existing project that uses pre-version 5.6 sample management scripts, you can set up day parts but they are not recognized. The use of day parts requires version 5.6 or higher sample management scripts.

Specify valid weekday participant call times:

Specify valid weekend participant call times:

When selected, the time parameters defined in the Valid participant call times section are used.

The maximum number of times that a record can be called. The default is 3. If an Appointment is made, then an additional “Maximum Tries” tries can be made to connect the appointment.

When selected, you can utilize an existing day parts template that defines valid participant call times.

The table lists all day parts that are currently defined for the project and allows you to add new day parts.

Clears any the Day Parts table.

Loads an existing day parts template.

Templates are stored in the Distributed Property Management (DPM). For more information, see Distributed Property Management (DPM).

Save the settings that are in the Day Parts table as a template in DPM.

You can specify a project expiry date and create appointment schedules.

An appointment schedule can specify the interviewer shifts and holidays, ensuring that appointments can be made when interviewers are working. There can be multiple appointment schedules for a distributed site.

Appointment schedules can differ between projects. For example, interviewers might be scheduled to call business projects during the day and consumer projects in the evening.

Provides options for specifying a project expiration time.

Provides options for clearing the existing sub-schedules, loading schedule templates, and saving schedule templates.

Displays the name of the currently loaded appointment schedule template. When a template is not loaded, not using template displays.

Lists available sub-schedules.

Enter a name in the Sub-schedule field.

Right-click the cell to the left of the sub-schedule name, and then click Remove.

The table lists all shifts defined for the selected sub-schedule.

Select a sub-schedule from the Sub-schedule list. If no sub-schedules exist, you must either create a new sub-schedule or load an appointment schedule template. Enter the appropriate shift information in the table.

The table lists all date override shifts currently defined for the selected sub-schedule. Date overrides allow you to specify specific dates and/or times where appointments are not allowed, as well as define specific dates and times that will override the shifts defined in the Regular Shifts table.

Select a sub-schedule from the Sub-schedule list. If no sub-schedules exist, you must either create a new sub-schedule or load an appointment schedule template. Enter the appropriate date override information in the table.

Clear any currently defined sub-schedules.

Loads an existing appointment schedule template.

Templates are stored in the Distributed Property Management (DPM). For more information, see Distributed Property Management (DPM).

Save the schedule settings as a template in DPM.

You can specify the parameters that control dialing for a subset of records. All records, except those in the specified subset, continue to follow the base dialing rules.

Parameters that can be overridden are:

In addition, you can specify that a subset of records be identified as having a high priority. High priority records are generally called before other records. This feature could be used, for example, if you discover that the completion percentage for a particular subset of records (region for example) is particularly low. You could indicate that the subset has priority until the completion percentage reaches the average, at which point you could disable the override.

Select this option when you want the specify that the Selection criteria value be identified as having priority over other records. High priority records are generally called before other records

Identifies the subset of records upon which the override parameters are based. Enter an appropriate criteria.

The table allows you to specify an override value (in minutes) for specific delay types:

Specifies the maximum number of callback attempts for each participant. Enter an appropriate value.