dial_override on the transfer API: dialing an exact number with no prefix

Normally when VICIdial dials a transfer, it does not send your raw number untouched. The campaign applies a dial prefix and a phone code first, so the digits that hit the carrier are not always the digits you typed. The dial_override flag on the transfer API turns that behavior off and dials exactly what you pass. It sounds small, but it solves a whole class of wrong-number transfers.

What gets added by default

Without the override, two things get prepended. The Dial prefix is the routing digit set the campaign uses to push a call out the right carrier path. The phone code is the country or long-distance code the campaign assumes. Both are fine for everyday dialing, where every number on a list needs the same treatment. They become a problem when you already hold a complete, dialable number and any extra digits would break it.

Setting dial_override to YES on a transfer_conference call tells VICIdial to dial the phone_number exactly as given, with no campaign-defined Phone Number Prefix and no phone code added. The default is NO, which keeps the normal prepend behavior, so you only opt in where you need it.

When to turn it on

flowchart TD
  A[Transfer to a number] --> B{Is the number already complete}
  B -->|Yes full E164| C[dial_override YES]
  B -->|No needs routing| D[dial_override NO]
  C --> E[Dial exact digits]
  D --> F[Add prefix and phone code]
  E --> G[Call placed]
  F --> G

The clearest case is a fully formatted international number. If your CRM hands you a complete E.164 number like 919998888112, you want it dialed as is. With the default behavior, the campaign would tack its prefix and phone code onto a number that already has its country code, and the call would fail or route somewhere strange. dial_override=YES dials the digits straight through. The same logic applies to extensions or special destinations that live in your dialplan and must not be reshaped.

Leave it off for ordinary list-style transfers. If you are sending a customer to a domestic closer line that expects the campaign routing, the prefix and phone code are doing real work, and overriding them just breaks the route. The flag is an exception switch, not a default. Think of it as a way to say this number is already exactly right.

A common gotcha shows up when a number works in one campaign and fails in another. The number did not change; the campaign routing did. Two campaigns can carry different prefixes and phone codes, so the same digits get reshaped two different ways. If your CRM stores numbers in one canonical format and hands them to whatever campaign the agent happens to be in, dial_override=YES makes that format the truth and removes the per-campaign guesswork. It is also the safer choice when a number was already validated upstream, because re-adding routing digits to a validated number is how you turn a good number into a misroute.

dial_override pairs naturally with BLIND_TRANSFER and with DIAL_WITH_CUSTOMER through the Agent API, since both can take a phone_number. If you are not sure whether a handoff should be a cold push or a live introduction, our guide to transferring to an external number walks through both, and the full picture lives in our transfers and closers guide.

Getting prefixes and phone codes right across campaigns is exactly the kind of thing a well-run dialer handles for you. See our pricing for a setup where dialing rules are configured cleanly from the start.