Support emergency calls made by agents

Note

The feature availability information is as follows.

Dynamics 365 Contact Center—embedded	Dynamics 365 Contact Center—standalone	Dynamics 365 Customer Service
Yes	Yes	Yes

This article describes how emergency calling works when agents dial an emergency number during crisis situations.

Note

• Emergency calling is currently supported in the United States, Puerto Rico, and Canada only where the emergency calling number is 911.
• If the Customize active conversation form is enabled and an agent initiates an outbound call to emergency services, the active conversation form doesn't display the Save and Refresh options.

Prerequisites

Make sure that the following prerequisites are complete so that the emergency calls work properly:

• The omnichannel agent user has a capacity profile associated with a voice outbound profile. For more information, see Configure capacity profiles and Create outbound profiles.

• Browser location setting is enabled, and set to United States, Canada, or Puerto Rico.

• For the email notification, the mailbox for the agents is enabled.

• For the emergency call to be handled, one of the following conditions must be fulfilled:

  • The number from which it originates must be a Microsoft calling plan number.

  Note

  If you use a third-party public switched telephone network (PSTN) carrier, discuss the emergency calling behavior with the carrier and then configure it.

  • When the Azure Communication Services resource (tenant) has both direct routing (third-party PSTN carrier number) and at least one direct offer (Microsoft calling plan number) enabled and there's no direct routing rule for the emergency number, the call will follow the direct offer path and will be routed to our direct offer emergency calling service. More information: Voice routing considersations

How emergency calls work

In Customer Service workspace or Contact Center workspace, agents can use the dialer to call the emergency number during a crisis.

Here's how the emergency calls work:

1. The agent calls the emergency number such as 911 in the United States, Canada, or Puerto Rico.
2. The agent status automatically changes to "Do not disturb," irrespective of the current status.
3. A temporary callback number is assigned to the agent for a duration of 60 minutes.
4. If the emergency call is dropped or gets disconnected, then the emergency responder can call back the agent via this callback number. The emergency callback gets the highest priority, bypassing all configured routing rules, capacity profiles, and presence settings.
5. During the ongoing emergency conversation, the Communication Panel displays the device settings and the End call button only. An alert appears indicating that an emergency call is in progress.
6. To ensure confidentiality, the application doesn't record or store the outgoing and incoming emergency calls as activities in call history.
7. If you configure emergency contacts, an automated email message goes out to the contacts when the agent dials the emergency number.
8. When the agent ends the emergency call, the agent presence changes back to the prior status.

Set up email recipients

When the agent makes an emergency call, the system can send an automated email to their supervisors or whoever needs to be informed about the call to ensure efficient emergency responder access. The system uses the Emergency Call Notification Template to send the email. You can use the Editor to modify the template.

1. In the Customer Service admin center or Contact Center admin center, go to User management under Customer support, and for Users, select Manage.
2. On the page that appears, select the Omnichannel Users view, and then select the user that you want to update.
3. Select the Omnichannel tab, and in Emergency Call Notifications, add the email addresses of the recipients separated by a semicolon.
4. Save the changes.

See also

Set up outbound calling in the voice channel
Set up inbound calling in the voice channel
Customize email template using template editor