VICIfast
Glossary

Preview dialing

The agent reads the lead's record first, then decides to place the call.

Preview dialing puts the lead's record on the agent's screen before any call is placed. The agent reads it, decides whether and when to dial, and triggers the call. Nothing is in flight until a human says so.

How it is set up in VICIdial

Set the campaign's Dial Method to MANUAL. The agent is served the next lead and clicks to dial rather than having calls pushed at them.

Several campaign settings shape what that looks like:

  • manual_dial_override - NONE, ALLOW_ALL or DISABLE_ALL, controlling whether agents may dial numbers that were not served to them
  • manual_dial_filter and manual_dial_search_filter - restrict what an agent-typed number is allowed to be
  • manual_dial_list_id - where agent-entered numbers get filed, defaulting to list 998
  • manual_dial_call_time_check - enable this to apply calling-hours rules to agent-initiated dials, which it does not do by default
  • get_call_launch - its PREVIEW_SCRIPT, PREVIEW_WEBFORM and PREVIEW_FORM values pop the script, web form or CRM record during the preview, not after connect

That manual_dial_call_time_check default is worth knowing before you rely on preview dialing for compliance: the automatic dialer enforces local calling hours, and manual dialing does not until you switch this on.

What it is for

Preview dialing is the right tool when the call is worth preparing for. High-value B2B, accounts with history worth reading, regulated outreach where the agent needs to confirm the consent record before dialing, and any campaign where the first fifteen seconds decide the outcome.

The cost

It is the slowest way to work a list by a wide margin, because you are paying an agent to read before every attempt and paying ring time on every attempt they make. Dials per agent-hour drop sharply against predictive dialing. That trade only makes sense when the value per conversation is high enough to fund it - which, on the campaigns people choose it for, it usually is.

See also