How to create custom fields (step by step)

Custom fields let you add your own boxes to the agent screen, either to show data already on a Lead or to capture new answers during a call. A Custom field is created per list, so each list can carry its own set, and you can copy a set to other lists later. This walkthrough builds a pulldown menu from scratch, since that's a common request and a little more involved than a plain text box.

Step 1: turn the feature on

• Set "Enable Custom List Fields" to 1 in the system settings so the feature is available at all.
• Enable "Custom Fields Modify" for the user who will be creating fields. It lives on the user modification page under Admin Interface Options.

Step 2: open the list

Go to Lists and click the list you want to add a field to. Scroll to the bottom of the list modification page and click the link that reads "Custom fields defined for this list:0". Once you've created fields, that 0 turns into the running count of how many the list has.

Step 3: fill in the field

For a favorite-color pulldown, the settings look like this. New Field Rank 1 and New Field Order 1 put it at the top-left. Field Label is the database name, something like favorite_color, and it's the one value you can never edit after submitting. Field Name is the prompt the agent reads, for example "What is your favorite color?". Field Name Position LEFT puts that prompt beside the box.

Set Field Type to SELECT for a single-choice pulldown. In Field Options, put one choice per line as a database value and a display label, like "red, Red", "blue, Blue", "silver, Silver". The first value should be lowercase with no spaces. Set Field Size to 3 so all three options are visible, leave Field Max blank since SELECT ignores it, and leave Field Default as NULL.

The full path from setting to screen

flowchart TD
  A[Enable Custom List Fields] --> B[Grant user Custom Fields Modify]
  B --> C[Open list, click custom fields link]
  C --> D[Set rank, label, name, type]
  D --> E[Submit]
  E --> F[Field appears on agent Form tab]
  F --> G[Captured on call, saved to lead]

Click submit at the bottom. The page reloads with a blue summary of your new field and a white preview of how it will look on the agent screen. You can go back and edit anything except the Field Label. From here, the field shows up on the lead loader's column-mapping screen and on every agent's Form tab when they're handling a lead from this list, on whatever Campaign uses it.

For how these fields fit into the wider list and lead workflow, see the VICIdial lists and leads guide, and if you're still getting your bearings, what is a VICIdial list covers the basics.

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