What a VICIdial Remote Agent is

A VICIdial Remote Agent is an account that forwards calls to an external phone or extension instead of putting a person in front of the VICIdial agent screen. The system treats it as a working agent and sends calls to it, but the call lands on a regular phone somewhere off the platform. There is no browser session, no screen, just a number that rings. This post explains what that account actually is, when you would reach for it, and the one thing it is often confused with.

An account, not a person at a screen

A normal Agent logs into the agent screen in a browser and works calls from there. A Remote agent skips that entirely. It is a record that tells VICIdial to route calls to an outside number, so a worker can answer on a desk phone, a cell phone, or an Extension on another phone system. As far as the dialer is concerned, that forwarded number is the agent. It rings, someone picks up, the call connects.

Because the call leaves through a Dialplan number you supply, the destination can be almost anything that number can reach. That flexibility is the whole point of the feature, and it is why a single record can stand in for a person who is nowhere near a computer.

The two jobs it is built for

There are two uses a Remote Agent is genuinely good at. The first is inbound calls for someone who does not want to be tied to a phone session or simply cannot sit at a computer. The call comes in, VICIdial forwards it to their phone, and they answer like any other ringing line. The second is outbound auto-dial work: broadcast and survey Campaign runs that play a message rather than connect to a live operator. For those, the Remote Agent record gives the dialer a place to send calls without any human staring at a screen.

flowchart LR
  A["Call enters VICIdial"] --> B{"Remote Agent ACTIVE?"}
  B -->|Yes| C["Forward to External Extension"]
  C --> D["Phone or off-platform extension rings"]
  D --> E["Worker answers off screen"]
  B -->|No| F["No call sent to this record"]

It is not the only way to work remotely

This is the part people get wrong. Having a worker in a remote location does not force you onto Remote Agents. If they have a computer and a browser, they can log in as a standard agent and use the full screen from anywhere, just like an in-office operator. Remote Agent is the right tool when there is no screen in the picture, not a requirement for working from home.

Where to go next

If you decide a Remote Agent fits, the setup is short and the full walkthrough is in how to add a new Remote Agent. If you are still weighing it against a normal screen login, read when to use a Remote Agent instead of a standard agent. For the bigger picture of how all of this fits together, the remote agents and mobile guide ties the pieces into one map. And if you would rather not stand up the server yourself, our managed VICIdial plans hand you a working dialer in under 40 seconds so you can get straight to routing calls.