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Use voice and Softphone

Voice conversations use the same conversation workspace as chat and email. When a conversation has active realtime media, CXP shows a Realtime media panel in the right rail. The Softphone is hidden until your browser joins the voice room. Once joining starts, the global conversation center in the top bar shows the browser-owned call. The selected conversation shows contextual call controls inline, while the global center keeps the same call available as you move between conversations and other CXP pages.

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Continue Chat after a widget call

After a widget Voice call ends, the customer can continue the same Chat. Sending another message keeps the ended call inactive. If the conversation is eligible for automatic resolution, its existing inactivity policy applies; repeated call-end notifications do not extend its cleanup deadline.

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Prerequisites

Before using voice:

• Your browser has microphone permission when joining a call.
• You have been admitted to the active call, or you are the assigned agent handling the customer’s active chat when they add an eligible phone call. You must have permission to participate. Assignment alone does not let you join another agent’s call.
• The conversation has an active joinable voice session.
• Your network allows the configured voice media connection.

For an outbound phone call, the conversation must also be Open, assigned directly to you, and linked to a Contact with a valid primary phone number. Your administrator must enable outbound voice and at least one calling number. The available choices may be provisioned tenant numbers or external caller IDs that an administrator has already confirmed with the Crescendo/telephony operator as authorized by the configured outbound carrier and configured with the required voice policy.

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Place an outbound phone call

To call the Contact from an existing conversation:

1. Open the conversation and review its history.
2. In Public reply, open the channel selector and choose Phone call.
3. In the right-rail Softphone, review the Contact name and primary phone. If more than one calling number is available, choose one from Calling number.
4. Select Place call.

To leave phone-call setup, select Cancel beside Place call. Your previous composer and unsent draft return with the editor focused. Cancel is also available while calling options load or fail; you do not need an active Chat. If the previous channel is no longer available, CXP opens Internal note and preserves the original draft. Cancel sends no message and makes no call request. Once a call is starting or active, use Disconnect. If the UI returns to Place call after a failure, Cancel is available again; it does not resolve an earlier uncertain call. Choosing Phone call only opens preparation in the existing right-rail Softphone. CXP does not dial or create a call interaction until you select Place call. With one enabled calling number, no selector is shown. With more than one, Place call remains disabled until you choose. After initiation, Place call changes immediately to the sole Disconnect control while the Softphone moves through Connecting, Calling, and Connected. Mute and Hold become available after Connected. The initial outbound flow does not require a separate Join Call step. An admitted participant who later needs to reconnect uses the normal call controls. If you disconnect while an outbound call is connecting, delayed setup replies do not reopen the ended attempt in CXP. A call with an uncertain provider result still shows Call status unknown and the duplicate-call warning below. Outbound calls do not automatically change the conversation status. If the conversation is Pending, Resolved, or Closed, move or reopen it to Open before calling. A later manual status change remains authoritative while the call continues. Each admitted attempt appears once in the conversation history with an explicit Outbound direction. The customer and agent transcript appears when available. Recording playback appears only when a recording was produced and your tenant policy permits it.

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Join a voice session

If you see Call is starting. Try again shortly., wait for audio to become ready before trying Join Call again. The call can appear in the conversation while its audio is still being prepared. Delayed connection updates do not, by themselves, end an incoming call. Once audio setup finishes, the call can proceed to the greeting. Confirmed caller hangups still cancel unfinished calls, including calls that use live translation. Open the conversation and use Join Call in the lower-right action area of the Realtime media panel, where Disconnect appears after connection. The panel shows the Contact and participating agents. Chat and Voice icons beside each participant show which active media are connected; focus or hover an icon for its text status. Before connection, the panel is the only voice-control surface and an unconnected Softphone is not displayed. Join Call reconnects your existing participation. It does not add an observer to someone else’s call. Use the normal Take Over action when the conversation is available for you to handle. If you are already handling chat and the same customer phones in, use Join Call on that conversation. You do not need to take over the conversation again. CXP checks that the incoming call is still available, adds you to that call, then connects your microphone. Your chat and assignment stay unchanged. This applies to a new incoming phone call with no other human handling it, not re-entry into a call you previously left. If CXP cannot confirm the Join request’s result, refresh the conversation before trying again. If participation was confirmed but the browser connection failed, use Join Call to reconnect. Neither failure ends your chat. Joining or rejoining stays Connecting until your microphone audio is published. If it fails, the panel explains whether microphone permission, a missing input device, publication, or connection needs attention. Follow that message, then retry with Join Call when it remains available. The initial Place call outbound connection is unchanged. If your microphone connects but expected caller audio is still missing after 10 seconds, the call remains connected with a warning. The warning clears if caller audio arrives. Disconnect leaves your active Chat and Voice; it is not a voice-only retry. After disconnecting, use Join Call only if it is still offered. For an eligible combined Chat + voice widget assignment, accepting the assignment automatically joins the current single-room voice session. CXP does not join an ended or stale room. Other voice flows continue to show the explicit Softphone join action when required. Live translation uses explicit Join Call in Realtime media after you accept the assignment and the translation connection is ready. Speak in your configured agent language after joining; accepting the assignment alone does not connect your microphone to the translated call.

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Start or restart widget voice after Chat handoff

Customers can start voice after you accept their widget Chat, then stop and restart voice while keeping Chat open, including when live translation is enabled. Each new call prepares its audio connection before Join Call becomes available. Accepting Chat does not connect your microphone. Customers can select End in the widget’s audio controls while voice is still starting. Audio stops locally, and the voice session finishes cleanup without leaving an active call. If they select Start again before cleanup finishes, the audio controls close without connecting. Wait briefly, then select Start again; restarting is not automatic. Chat stays open. If a customer is already using voice when they request a human, their voice session stays open while they wait for acceptance. Join after the translation connection is ready. If the assigned agent changes before joining, follow the updated conversation state; the customer may need to start a fresh voice session once the new agent is ready. An agent without configured translation languages uses the supported ordinary voice connection instead. If that browser connection fails after acceptance, the conversation remains assigned to you and CXP reports the voice failure separately. Use Join Call to retry. Before joining, CXP verifies the current conversation state. If you already participate in another active voice call, the request is rejected and the panel refreshes so you can try again after leaving the other call.

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Add another participant — Coming soon

The forthcoming Conference action adds an eligible agent to the existing call and all active Chat interactions. A supported Voice-only call can also invite an external endpoint. Assignment stays unchanged. Disconnect leaves your participation; an ordinary phone conference ends when fewer than two people or phone endpoints remain. Customer media icons reflect the customer’s own participation. The picker will keep call controls accessible while you search Online colleagues by name or team. Connected channel icons use green circles; picker dots and words show availability separately. See Conference for the workflow, customer indicators and Widget call behavior.

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In-call controls

While you are viewing the call’s conversation, use the inline controls in Realtime media to:

• Mute or unmute yourself.
• Hold or resume when supported. A connected, admitted agent with the required permissions can use these controls even when another agent is assigned.
• Disconnect the active realtime media you handle.

After you navigate away, use the global conversation center’s live call status or conversation row to return directly to the call’s conversation and its controls. While a call connects, the same inline control surface is already in place; its controls become available without moving Disconnect when the connection completes. The minimized call pill never includes Disconnect, keeping the destructive action away from the expansion control. Switching or closing conversation tabs does not disconnect the browser-owned call. The associated conversation tab remains marked while the call is active. If the call moves to another conversation, its navigation follows that conversation without reconnecting your microphone. The server-projected conversation state remains the authority for whether Join or lifecycle Disconnect actions are available. If an outbound Disconnect fails, the panel shows Disconnect failed and keeps the same Disconnect button available to retry. The panel can remain visible after the call’s timeline entry ends while disconnection is still being confirmed. Retrying does not start another call or disconnect a newer connection.

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End a translated inbound phone call

After you accept an incoming phone call and connect through live translation, Disconnect ends both voice legs when you are the last participating agent. The customer’s call ends and the enquiry stays Open. If another agent is participating or joining, the call continues. This applies whether you accept the call before or after its two translation rooms are created.

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Voice transcript and recordings

Voice activity can appear in the conversation timeline as transcript rows and call recording entries. Transcript rows help agents follow context during and after the call. When recording playback is available, use it for review and quality checks according to your tenant policies. Live-translated calls can provide separate Customer view and Agent view recordings after hangup when recording is enabled.

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Handle chat and voice together

When the same conversation has active Chat and Voice interactions, the Realtime media panel shows both icons on the relevant participants. Use its single Disconnect action to leave your Chats and your local Voice connection. Disconnect starts immediately, without a confirmation dialog. A Chat ends when you leave its last agent membership, unless another agent is still participating in its linked widget call. In that case the widget stays open so the customer’s call continues. Customer text remains in the conversation for that agent to read and answer verbally; sending a text reply still requires Chat participation. When the linked call ends, Chat ends too unless an agent has joined Chat meanwhile. Other agents stay connected, and assignment stays unchanged. A failed effect can be retried without disconnecting a newer connection. A call connected in another tab or device must be disconnected there. That does not prevent you from disconnecting Chat in this tab. Closing a browser tab alone does not remove your Chat membership. The two effects settle independently. If one fails, CXP reports the failed medium and refreshes the panel without hiding the successful result. When the last agent leaves a widget call, the widget sends the confirmed agent-left notice before closing the Chat connection. This also applies to translated calls and Conference calls. Each agent’s departure appears once; an earlier agent leaving does not close a call that another agent continues.

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Widget Voice after an established Chat — Coming soon

When the customer adds Voice, each eligible agent already participating in the Widget Chat receives call access and sees Join Call. Select it to connect your audio. This works for one agent or several Conference participants and does not depend on the conversation’s assignment. Access counts toward your Voice workload before audio connects. Disconnect also cancels that access if you have not joined yet. A connected call in another browser still uses its own Disconnect control. If you were busy when Voice began, try Join Call after leaving the other call. The remaining Chat agent can also join a new Voice segment after the customer stops and restarts it. See Voice added after Chat for Conference behavior. Production availability of this correction is not yet verified; existing Join and Disconnect controls keep their placement.

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AI and human handoff

An AI Assistant answers each new voice interaction first, gathers context, and can hand off to a human when needed. A handoff completed for an earlier chat or call does not suppress the handoff tools for the new interaction. During handoff, CXP keeps the conversation as the source of truth so the agent sees customer context, transcript information, and AI summary data in the workspace.

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Troubleshooting

If an earlier call still appears to block your work, Place call or Take Over can check and finish a previous disconnection before evaluating your new request. The new action proceeds only if its normal permissions and call checks pass. If the check cannot finish, retry the action later. Check again only refreshes availability; it does not start a call or repair a connection. If Take Over connects Chat but not Voice, that Chat connection remains valid. You may need to select Take Over again after the previous Voice connection has been checked; the first action does not silently repeat itself. If you cannot join:

• Confirm the conversation still has an active voice session.
• Confirm you are a participant in the active call and have the required permissions. Being the assignee alone is not enough.
• Leave any other active voice call before retrying Join Call.
• Check browser microphone permissions.
• Refresh the conversation if the call state changed recently.
• Ask an administrator to confirm phone and routing configuration.
• For outbound calls, confirm the conversation is Open and assigned directly to you, and ask an administrator to confirm the tenant switch and calling number.

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Transfer your participation

Select Transfer beside the conversation’s media controls to hand your active Chat and Voice participation to another agent. Completion is automatic after acceptance and readiness. External Transfer supports Open, Voice-only conversations. See Transfer a live conversation for assignment rules, connection feedback and returning through a new Conference invitation.