Overview
By using the Virtual Front Desk (VFD), companies can provide live assistance to visitors and traveling employees via video call. This is a great way to support locations that might not have a full-time staffed front desk. The VFD can work at any Envoy location you pair a kiosk to, so there's no limit to the number of locations you can support virtually.
You'll need a VFD license for each enabled location. These locations do not need to be active Visitors locations. Learn more about Virtual Front Desk billing.
How it works
Visitors will be able to call for assistance by using the iPad. Once enabled, a Call for assistance button will appear on your kiosk.
When the Call for assistance button is pressed, a video call will be initiated, connecting your visitor to the designated admin or team. Your admin or team will receive a notification with instructions on how to join the call. By clicking on the link in the notification, they'll enter the call and be able to assist your guest!
As an admin, you can choose whether to have your audio and video on. For the best experience, we recommend both! Your visitor's kiosk will always have audio and video on.
To end the call, the visitor or admin can just click/tap on the End call button! The screen will then change to confirm that the call has been disconnected.
Video - Enabling your Virtual Front Desk
How to Enable
Ensure that your firewall allows traffic from our Allowlist URLs and IP addresses.
Our VFD product uses:
*.agora.io
*.edge.agora.io
*.sd-rtn.com
*.edge.sd-rtn.co
To enable
Navigate to Global overview > Virtual front desk.
You'll see a list of locations and how many kiosks are paired.
Select the employee, channel (Slack), or group chat (MS Teams) to receive call notifications for each location. Employees can serve as a virtual receptionist for multiple locations if desired.
For individual employee notifications, they must have logged into Envoy at least once and have a verified account.
For slack channel notifications, please follow the setup instructions.
For MS Teams group chat notifications, please follow the setup instructions.
Once you have a virtual receptionist or channel assigned, toggle ON the switch under Enable.
Pair a kiosk if your location does not already have one paired. Learn more about pairing a Virtual front desk kiosk.
To change the assignee, just click on the ✏️ symbol and make the necessary changes, then click Save.
Notification Settings
You can set the default notification settings for your team under Global Overview > Virtual Front Desk > Settings.
Currently, the notification methods available are:
Email
SMS
an individual user
an individual user
Users must still enable their personal notification preferences to receive the VFD calls. Learn more about notification preferences.
Notifying a Slack channel
Instead of notifying a single individual, you can use Slack to notify an entire channel! This helps ensure your calls are answered promptly.
See Setting up a Slack channel for Virtual Front Desk for detailed setup instructions.
Using the dropdown under Who to notify, select Slack channel. Click on Choose a Slack channel and begin typing your channel. If installed correctly, you should see your vfd-enabled channels! Select the channel you wish to notify. Remember to Save.
You can only notify one channel per location, but you can add the same channel to multiple locations.
Notifying a Teams Group chat
Instead of notifying a single individual, you can use Teams to notify a group chat! This helps ensure your calls are answered promptly. Note: You'll need to have Envoy version Version 2.1 + to use this feature.
See Setting up a Teams Group Chat for Virtual Front Desk for detailed setup instructions.
Using the dropdown under Who to notify, select Teams channel. Click on Choose a Teams channel and begin typing your group chat name. If installed correctly, you should see your vfd-enabled groups!
Select the channel you wish to notify and click Save.
Answering a call
Answering a call from a visitor is easy - just click the link to connect with your guest directly!
The call will open in a browser window, so virtual receptionists do not need to have Envoy Mobile installed or log in to the Envoy dashboard. However, it's best to easily access Envoy to view a Visitor's invite or see if their host is onsite using the employee log.
The call can be answered on a computer, mobile phone, or tablet! The only technical requirement is that your browser has access to your microphone and camera. You will be connected using your device's default browser.
Error messages
Call timed out
Admin
If the call isn't answered in time, it will expire. Receptionists will see a Call timed out screen when clicking a link after a minute.
Visitor
On the kiosk, the screen will default to an error state explaining that team members are not available to take the call.
Connectivity issues
If your iPad kiosk or answering device has internet issues, the call will drop and display an error screen on both devices.
Admin
Visitor
If outbound calls from the kiosk are failing to connect, confirm that you are allowing traffic from ALL Envoy services on our Allowlist.
FAQ
Can anyone with the link answer a call?
Yes, anyone with access to the call link can answer the active call on their device. They do not need to be logged into Envoy to do this.