How to Record an Answering-Machine Message by Phone

When VICIdial reaches an answering machine instead of a live person, it can play a pre-recorded message and hang up rather than leaving dead air. That message gets set in the Answering Machine Message field on the Campaigns screen — and you can record the audio file without ever touching a computer. All you need is a phone connected to your VICIdial server. The process uses extension 8168, VICIdial's built-in phone-based prompt recorder Call recording.

This approach is useful when your marketing team or compliance officer wants to approve the exact wording before it goes live, and they would rather record their own voice than hand a script to IT. It also avoids the audio-quality issues that come from converting an MP3 recorded on a laptop microphone.

How answering-machine detection routes the call

Answering-machine detection (AMD) AMD (answering machine detection) is the process VICIdial uses to classify a connected call as a live human or a voicemail system before deciding what to do next. When AMD determines the call hit a machine, VICIdial checks the campaign's Answering Machine Message field. If a filename is set there, the system plays that file and disconnects. If the field is empty, the behavior falls back to whatever the Drop Action specifies. The recording you create in this guide is what fills that field Campaign.

flowchart TD
  A[Dial 8168] --> B[Enter ID 4321 then pound]
  B --> C[Record message after beep]
  C --> D[Press pound when done]
  D --> E{Choose option}
  E --> F[1 Save]
  E --> G[2 Listen]
  E --> H[3 Re-record]
  F --> I[System reads filename]
  I --> J[Enter filename in Campaigns screen]

Step-by-step: dialing 8168 and recording your message

Pick up the phone connected to your VICIdial system and dial 8168. You will hear a prompt asking for an ID. Enter 4321 followed by the pound (#) key. After authentication, the system reads you the recording instructions. Wait for the beep, then speak your answering-machine message clearly — state who the call is from, leave a callback number if appropriate, and keep it under 30 seconds. When you finish, press the pound key to stop recording.

You are then given three options: press 1 to save, press 2 to listen back to what you just recorded, or press 3 to record it again from scratch. If anything sounds off — background noise, a stumble in the wording, the wrong phone number — press 3 and try again. When you are satisfied and press 1, the system plays back the filename it assigned. That filename is what you will copy into the VICIdial admin screen.

The first recording on a fresh system is named 85100001. Each subsequent recording increments by one: 85100002, 85100003, and so on. The filename does not include a path or file extension when VICIdial plays it back — just the eight-digit number. Write it down as you hear it.

Setting the filename in the Campaigns screen

Log in to the VICIdial admin panel and navigate to the Campaigns screen. Find the campaign where you want to use the recording, click Modify, and scroll to the Answering Machine Message field. Enter the filename exactly as the system read it to you — for example, 85100001. Save the campaign. From that point on, any call that AMD ViciAMD classifies as an answering machine will play that file before disconnecting.

If you need to replace the message later, dial 8168 again, record a new file, and update the Answering Machine Message field with the new filename. The old file remains on disk but is no longer used by the campaign — it will not interfere.

The same 8168 workflow covers other recording needs. For the safe-harbor message — the recorded disclosure required when a campaign drops to prerecorded audio — see How to Record a Safe-Harbor Message by Phone. For the full picture of what the 8168 extension can record and where each file type is used, see the VICIdial Phone-Based Functions Guide.

Also worth noting: the same filename you record here can be used in other places beyond the Answering Machine Message field. The Safe Harbor Exten field in the Campaigns screen, the Drop Exten field in the In-Groups screen, the after-hours message for an In-Group Ingroup, and several Campaign Survey options all accept filenames recorded through 8168. One recording session can stock multiple configuration fields.

If you want a VICIdial system that arrives pre-configured and ready for this kind of setup work, every VICIfast plan ships a dedicated VICIdial server in under 40 seconds, with the 8168 prompt recorder enabled and ready to use.