| Name
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Explanation
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Example/Notes
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Typical Value(s)
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| ASR Language
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Select the language for the speech recognizer to use to identify speech.
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Select en-gb for British English.
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| Before beginning of speech timeout
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The time, in milliseconds, after which the system times out if no input is received from the caller. The timer starts counting after the prompt has finished playing. This triggers the standard apology timeout prompt, followed by a timeout prompt.
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The number of times the timeout prompt plays to the caller is determined by the Maximum no input count parameter. If this limit is reached, GAAP transfers the caller somewhere else.
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The default value is 5000 milliseconds.
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| Collection barge-in
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Specify whether callers can interrupt an announcement that is being played to them in order to collect information.
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For example, you might set up the initial prompt in a callflow to ask the caller to select a department. If you enable this option, the caller can make the selection before the prompt finishes.
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This option is often enabled for IVR applications, especially when long announcements are used and it is not necessary for a caller to hear all of the options.
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| Confirmation barge-in
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Specify whether callers can interrupt a confirmation announcement.
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A confirmation announcement asks callers to confirm information gathered by the system is correct. For example, you might ask the caller to specify his or her full address, and GAAP plays back this information to confirm it was recognized correctly.
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Enable this option for efficiency and speed of use. However, consider areas within the application in which this must be disabled (such as confirmation of a PIN number).
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| Collection high confidence threshold & Collection low confidence threshold
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Specify the upper and lower threshold, from 0.0 to 1.0, to evaluate the quality of the caller’s input during speech recognition. The speech-recognition engine generates this confidence score as an indicator of how closely the caller's utterance matches the phrases specified in the grammar. GAAP can initiate a confirmation or retry prompt if the score falls below the Collection low confidence threshold.
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The speech-recognition engine awards a high confidence score when the application receives non-ambiguous input. In this case, the application usually accepts the response and continue on. However, if the caller's utterance is assigned a confidence score between the high and low thresholds set, GAAP can ask for confirmation ("Is this correct?").
Important You can set a menu option to Always confirm to confirm inputs regardless of the value set in the Collection high confidence threshold.
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Set these values depending on the type of information collected. For example, if the application asks the caller for feedback on the IVR experience, you can set a low value for the Collection high confidence threshold as it's not imperative that this information is verified. However, if the application asks for a credit card number, a high threshold can be used to ensure the information is correct.
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| DTMF complete timeout
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The time, in milliseconds, after which the system times out after the caller has stopped entering information in response to a DTMF question.
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You might ask the caller to enter a five-digit account number. If this option is set to 0, the system proceeds to the next stage without delay after five digits have been collected.
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You might set a low value to avoid a long pause after the last digit is entered.
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| DTMF inter-digit timeout
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The amount of time, in milliseconds, the system waits between each DTMF input character before interpreting the DTMF string.
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You might ask the caller to enter a 16-digit credit card number, but the caller only enters 15 digits by mistake. GAAP waits the specified number of milliseconds before timing out and prompting the caller to re-enter the number.
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This depends on the complexity of the question the caller was asked. For example, if you asked the caller to "press 1 for accounts and 2 for sales", no inter-digit time delay is required. However, with requests for longer, more complex information, you might want to give the caller extra time to finish entering digits.
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| DTMF termination character
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If specified, this is the DTMF character you want the caller to press when he or she has finished entering DTMF information. This termination character indicates the input is finished (for example #).
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You must inform callers to use this character in all prompts that require DTMF input. For example: "Please enter your 16-digit credit card number, followed by the # key."
Important If the caller does not press the terminating character, GAAP waits for the value you specified for DTMF complete timeout before accepting the input. Therefore, if you are using a termination character, you must increase the DTMF complete timeout value.
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If you want the caller to enter a five-digit account number, but you do not want a time delay after the caller has finished, you can ask the caller to enter the number, followed by the # key. This way, the system is sure the caller has finished entering data.
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This depends on the nature of the data requested from the caller. If you are asking the caller to press one digit, a termination character might not be necessary. However, if you ask the caller to provide a string of digits, such as a credit card number, you might want to use a termination character.
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| Input mode(s)
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Specify which input modes to enable.
- DTMF
- Voice
- DTMF and Voice.
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You can use DTMF to collect information relating to significant numbers, such as credit card numbers and account IDs. You might also want to use speech recognition at times when DTMF is not feasible (for example, asking the customer for a full postal address).
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You might want to turn off voice recognition if you are expecting the caller to be calling from a noisy environment.
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| Maximum help count
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Specify the maximum number of times a caller can ask for help during a single Menu or Question block before they are rerouted.
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You might want to route the caller to an agent if he or she asks for help several times during a call.
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The default value is 2.
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| Maximum no input count
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The maximum number of times a retry prompt plays to a caller if no caller input is received. At this point the call transfers somewhere else.
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If a caller finds a particular question to be confusing, he or she might not provide any feedback. If this option is set, the call routes to another number, such as an agent.
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The default value is 2.
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| Maximum recognition timeout
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The maximum amount of time the system wait for the speech-recognition engine to recognize an utterance after it has detected speech. If this time is exceeded, you can initiate a retry prompt.
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For example, if the caller is talking in a noisy environment, he or she might stop talking but the speech-recognition engine might think the caller is still speaking. This setting allows you to allocate a set amount of time for the engine to analyze the input.
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This value depends on the type of question you have asked the caller. If you anticipate a complicated answer, give the speech-recognition engine a longer time to interpret the response.
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| Maximum recording timeout
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The maximum length of time to allow a caller to make a recording. This option is only relevant to Recording blocks.
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GAAP can detect when the caller is speaking (without speech recognition) and continues onto the next block when the caller stops speaking. However, if the background noise is too loud, GAAP might confuse this with speech. Therefore, this parameter sets the absolute maximum time the recording can last.
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This value depends on the type of question you have asked the caller. If you have asked an open-ended question, you must ensure that you leave enough time for the caller to give a proper answer. If you anticipate the answer to be short, a quicker timeout can be set. However, if you set a higher value, the caller might stop speaking after 10 seconds but GAAP hears noise on the line and thinks the caller is still talking.
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| Maximum retry count
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The maximum number of retries you want to allow a caller. A retry might be necessary if a digit entered was not recognized during a DTMF response, or if a low confidence is calculated by the speech-recognition engine during a spoken response.
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You might ask the caller to enter an account number using the keypad. In this case, you might want to allow at least one retry in case digits are entered incorrectly. However, if you ask the caller to speak an account number, you might want to allow more than one retry in case speech recognition is more complicated.
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This value depends on the difficulty of what you are asking the caller. The more difficult the question, the more retries you might allow. However, too many retry attempts might frustrate the caller. You can also ensure your retry prompt acknowledges the difficulty the caller might be experiencing.
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| Recognition complete timeout
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The length of silence, in milliseconds, after which the system times out after the caller provides an answer that matches something in the grammar.
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If the caller provides a recognized response and then stops talking, this value specifies how long to wait before proceeding. However, if the response is not recognized in the grammar, the Recognition incomplete timeout parameter determines how long the system waits before timing out.
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The longer the expected utterance is, the larger this value should be. This timeout setting can be set to the same value (or slightly shorter than) the Recognition incomplete timeout value. For example:
- "yes/no" question – 500
- menus – 1000
- speaking credit card numbers – 3000
This could be followed up by a confirmation prompt, depending on the confidence score attained by the caller’s answer.
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| Recognition incomplete timeout
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The length of silence in milliseconds after which the system will timeout when the caller stops talking, but has not yet mentioned any required words or phrases.
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For example, if a caller pauses in the middle of providing an answer, (such as a postcode which normally comes in two parts), the Application will not be able to match the utterance against anything in the Grammar. If the caller does not continue, the Application will wait the specified number of milliseconds before timing out. Thus giving the caller the time to provide the final piece of the answer.
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The longer the expected utterance is, the larger this value should be.
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This is normally followed up by a retry prompt.
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Recording complete timeout
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The amount of time in milliseconds after which a caller stops talking when providing a recorded response, before the call will accept the recording and continue to the next block/question.
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This option is only relevant to Recording blocks.
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If you have asked the caller for feedback during a questionnaire, you may want to set the amount of time to wait before proceeding to the next block/question after they have finished answering. This may be a few seconds so as to allow them time to think if they have anything else to add.
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This depends on the nature of the question. If it is an open-ended question, you may want to set this a bit higher in case the caller decides that they have more to add. If it is a straight forward answer which is only expected to have a one or two word response, this value should be lower.
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Recovery mode enabled
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Allows you to specify whether or not recovery mode is enabled. This involves the use of Recovery prompts as a method of returning the caller to the start of the current question to allow them to attempt the call again, therefore avoiding the failure path.
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An example prompt may be as follows: “I’m having problems understanding. Do you want to try again or speak to an Agent?” “Try again” will return the caller to the main menu.
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This is disabled by default.
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Sensitivity
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The sensitivity of the speech recogniser to noise during input recognition. The value entered must be between 0.0 (least sensitive to noise) and 1.0 (highly sensitive to quiet input). Thus, if you set the property to a low value, the recogniser is less sensitive to noise, but the user must speak more loudly in order to be recognised.
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The sensitivity level should be above 0.5 if you expect the majority of your callers to be located in a quiet environment, such as their own home. This should be set below 0.5 if you expect the callers to be located in a busy environment, e.g. a busy workplace.
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The default is 0.5. However, this should be adjusted depending on the level of background noise you expect callers to be experiencing in the environment from which they are calling.
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If an adjustment is required, this should be done using small increments/decrements, one day or week at a time, as minor adjustments can have significant affects.
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Transfer timeout
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The time in seconds to wait before a call exits with a result of ‘no answer’. If there are several phone numbers provisioned, this is the maximum time to wait for each one before timing out.
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If the caller was asked to select a department to be connected to, and no one in the department answers, and no voice mail is available, the caller could be rerouted to the receptionist to allow them to leave a message.
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This should be set to a value which allows people a reasonable amount of time to answer the call – but not too long that the caller looses patience.
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For information on the other more advanced Preferences (not mentioned in the table above), contact SpeechStorm Support
If any of the ‘Maximum’ values are exceeded (apart from Maximum recording timeout), the block will exit with a result of ‘recognition failure’. This usually results in the call being routed to an Agent, but this can be overridden.
Getting your timeout values right is key to making your Application as pleasant to use as possible. Shorter timeouts mean a snappier response to the caller, but may also mean that the caller gets interrupted by the system before they have finished speaking.
SpeechStorm gives you the power to make small, incremental changes to such Application parameters, deploy them to production today, check the statistics over time, and if no improvement is obvious (or it’s detrimental), roll back to the previous value/version. All this can be done without having to make software changes, do extensive release/testing cycles, or take the Application offline.
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