Holiday or shutdown period? Prep your phones!

If your company is shutting down and won't be answering calls over an extended period, or even just for one day, read this!

It's Christmas time. It's stressful and you can't wait to get out of the office and put your feet up. But! Remember to switch your phones over so your customers know what you're up to, and when your team will be back. 

Maybe it's just a long weekend, but the same applies. How can we let our customers know we're out of the office. 

Getting set up

  1. Log into the Cradle admin website, and head to the Rules page
  2. Click on New Rule in the top right corner, and give a new office an obvious name, such as Christmas Holidays
  3. Set your hours to Specific Hours, and then choose Closed every day
  4. For during hours and after hours select voicemail
  5. Enter the email address for who should receive any voicemail that is left
  6. Record a suitable message (you can use your Jabra headset and either Quicktime (macOS) or Voice Recorder (Windows). You can also use this online tool. Consider these questions. When are you closed from? When are you opening again? What do your customers do if they have an emergency? Remember to include your business name. You might want to discourage callers from leaving a voicemail if there is a better option, such as your website, for information they may need.
  7. Check that the message is an MP3 or a WAV file. If it isn't an MP3 or WAV file, convert it to an MP3 (you can use this online tool). DO NOT just change the extension of the file. 
  8. Upload the file to your Christmas Holidays after hours voicemail. 
  9. Activate the rule, by going to the Numbers page and selecting the new Rule for all applicable numbers. Make a note of your current rule for each number as you'll need to go back to this when you return. 

You're done!

If you have staff on call

You can modify your holiday hours rule above, by sending calls to a Number for your after hours rule instead. Forward calls to a mobile or the beach house landline. 

After you're back

When you come back, you need to change the rule for your numbers back to your standard rules.