The automated phone tree with the human touch! This phone tree relies
on old-fashioned person-to-person communication - no auto-dialers. But it builds the tree on the fly, so there is no
setup work and it doesn't depend on everyone being reliable and available. Read more below.
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Software Description
What is it?
This software allows you to manage and activate a phone tree. A traditional phone
tree is pre-assigned, so that if someone in the tree drops the ball and fails to
make the calls, some people don't get called. Ian's Phone Tree is different because
it the structure is created on the fly: the more people who can help make calls,
the quicker everyone gets called. The system ensures that everyone gets called.
What about e-mail?
Unfortunately we don't support contacting people by email because of the possibility
that someone will misuse this feature for sending spam mail.
Typical scenario: Let's say you you are school principal and the
school has flooded and is full of crocodiles, so the parents have to come and pick up their kids ASAP. You
already have a list of the parents names and phone numbers stored on your computer.
You come to the web site for Ian's Phone Tree, and create a new Alert. An "Alert"
is an activation of a phone tree. You copy the list of names and paste them into
a web page to set up the recipient list. Then you start calling. The web site presents
one name at a time for you to call. Let's say you reach an answering machine first.
You leave the information and then enter a note into the web site to try later. Then on
the second person, you reach a real person. You give her the information, and also
ask if she can help call. Since she has an internet
connection and doesn't want the children to be eaten by crocodiles, she offers to
help. You give
her the web site address, and the alert number and password, and she can log in and start
calling. She asks everyone she reaches to help call, and so on. The system makes
sure that no matter how many people are calling, that each recipient is only being
called by one helper at a time.
A note about time-outs: If someone starts to make a call, but then
they don't finish or they lose an internet connection, the system will stop waiting
after five minutes. If a person is called and a log entry is made, but it was not
a successful contact, the recipient will be moved forward in the queue by 15 minutes.