Cisco Cisco IPCC Web Option Leaflet

During the consultation leg of a consultative conference, the conferencing agent can reconnect with the 
caller and release the consult call leg. To do so, the agent simply clicks the Reconnect button. This action 
causes the agent desktop to instruct the Unified CM PIM to instruct Unified CM to release the 
consultation call leg and to reconnect the agent with the original caller.

This is basically the process an agent should use when they want to make a consultation call but for 
foreseen or unforeseen reasons do not desire to complete the conference. After a call is successfully 
reconnected, the conferencing agent's desktop functionality will be exactly the same as before they 
requested the conference. Therefore, the conferencing agent can later request another conference, and 
there is no limit to the number of consultation calls an agent can make.

Consultative conferences and reconnects are all done from the agent desktop and use the single 
Unified CM extension that is associated with the Unified CCE. The Unified CCE system does not 
support allowing the conferencing agent to place the original caller on hold and then use a second 
extension on their hardware phone to make a consultation call. The hardware phone offers a button to 
allow this kind of conference, but it is not supported in a Unified CCE environment.   If an agent 
conferences a call in this way, any call data will be lost because the Unified ICM did not route the call.

Alternate is the ability for the agent to place the consultation call leg on hold and then retrieve the 
original (or conference) call leg while in the midst of a consultative conference. The agent can then 
alternate again to place the original caller back on hold and retrieve the consultation call leg. An agent 
can alternate a call as many times as they would like.

When the conferencing agent has alternated back to the original caller, the only call controls (buttons) 
that are enabled are Release and Alternate. The Conference (Complete) and Reconnect controls will be 
disabled. The Alternate control will alternate the conferencing agent back to talking with the consulted 
party. When the agent has alternated back to the consultation leg, the Release, Alternate, Conference, 
and Reconnect call controls will be enabled. The Alternate control will alternate the conferencing agent 
back to talking with the original caller. The Conference control will complete the conference, and the 
Reconnect button will drop the consulted party and reconnect the agent with the original caller.

Conferences to numbers not in the DNP or to numbers configured in the DNP with post-route set to No 
are allowed but do not result in a Unified ICM-routed call. In these scenarios, the PIM simply sends a 
call conference request directly to Unified CM and uses the dialed number from the conference dialog 
on the agent desktop. Call data is lost if the Unified ICM does not route the call. Cisco recommends that 
any dialed number for a conference should have a match in the DNP, that it be marked for post-route, 
and that it have a DNP type that is allowed for the conferencing agent (based on the agent’s desk 
settings).

If the conference is to a specific agent, then the agent requesting the conference must enter the agent ID 
into the conference dialog box. The DNP entry matching the dialed number (agent ID) must have DNP 
type equal to PBX. This causes the PIM to place the dialed number (agent ID) into the CED field before 
it sends the route request to the Unified ICM router. In the script editor, use the agent-to-agent routing 
node and specify the CED field as the location of the agent ID so that the Unified ICM router will route 
this call properly.