What’s new for 8x8 Contact Center agents in July?

In this release of 8x8 Agent WorkspaceClosedThe brand new interface for 8x8 Contact Center agents to receive and process customer interactions., we have introduced the following enhancements:

Embedded 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone

We have introduced an enhanced call-answering experience using the embedded 8x8 AgentClosedAgents use the Agent Console to view and manage customer interactions. Virtual Contact Center supports Regular agents and Supervisor agents. Workspace softphone. Until now, agents had to use a hard phone, a cell phone, or a softphone app to answer calls in 8x8 Agent Workspace. With 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone, agents can answer calls directly from the browser without having to leave the application.

Note: When using Agent Workspace softphone, agents are not required to log in to 8x8 Work for Desktop to answer calls in 8x8 Agent Workspace.

If using 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone and 8x8 Work for Desktop simultaneously, incoming 8x8 Contact Center calls are offered and can be answered on both apps. Calls to the 8x8 Work phone or extension are only offered on 8x8 Work for Desktop to keep the Contact Center lines open for customers.

For more information on 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone, refer to Use 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone as your workplace phone.

Ability to enable a secondary ring device when using 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone

When using the embedded 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone to handle customer interactions, you can choose to enable a secondary ring device. Let’s say you are using headphones to communicate with customers. When your headset is off, you may not hear when an interaction is offered before it times out. To ensure that you can always hear the ringtone when an interaction is offered, you can enable another device to ring in addition to your headphones.

To enable a secondary ring device:

  1. Go to Change status > Audio settings. The options open in a floating window.
    -OR-
    Go to Change status > My profile > Settings > Audio settings.
  2. Click the toggle switch next to Enable secondary ring device. New options display when the secondary ring device is enabled.

    3. Note: This option is only available when your Phone setup is set to Use Agent Workspace. For more information, see how to set up your workplace phone.

  3. Select a device from the Secondary ring device list.
  4. Adjust the speaker volume.
  5. If updating the audio from My profile, click Save settings. A confirmation banner displays to notify you that your profile has been updated successfully.

For more information, see how to change the audio settings.

Ability to customize sounds per channel when using 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone

When using the 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone, you can customize the sounds for each channel type. This enhancement enables you to select a different sound for incoming calls, incoming chats and emails, and chat messages received after accepting the interaction. 

Note: The selected sound for phone interactions plays in a loop to ensure that you do not miss the calls offered to you. This experience only applies to voice interaction sounds when using 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone.

To customize interaction sounds:

  1. Click the Change status menu option and change your status to Work Offline.
  2. Click the Change status > My profile.
  3. From the Settings tab, scroll down to the Personalization section and configure the following sound settings for the embedded 8x8 Agent Workspace softphone:
    • Voice interaction sound: Select a ringtone from the list for inbound calls. By default, the Peaceful sound is selected. The sound plays continuously until you accept/reject the interaction or the acceptance timer reaches zero.
    • Incoming chat/mail sound: Select a ringtone from the list for inbound chat, SMS, and emails. By default, the sound is set to None.
    • Chat message sound: Select a chat message sound from the list to receive an audible notification whenever the customer replies to your message. By default, the sound is set to None.
  1. Click Save settings.

Ability to chat with Microsoft Teams users from 8x8 Agent Workspace

8x8 Agent Workspace users can now chat with Microsoft Teams contacts directly from the app. This feature simplifies cross-organizational communication, promotes quick call resolution, and empowers agents to collaborate effortlessly with contacts that are on the Microsoft Teams platform.

Note: You must have a license to use Microsoft Teams to be able to chat with your Microsoft Teams contacts from 8x8 Agent Workspace.

For more information, see how to start a chat with Microsoft Teams users.

Enhanced Presence Sync between 8x8 Agent Workspace and Microsoft Teams

The enhanced 8x8 Presence Sync enables the integration of Microsoft Teams presence into your 8x8 applications, as well as the presence status of 8x8 users who are on active calls in the Teams environment. This means that as an agent, when using both 8x8 Agent Workspace and Microsoft Teams to handle calls, the bi-directional presence sync will automatically update your status in both apps. The status changes in real-time but the duration may be impacted by the system load time.

This enhancement empowers you to maintain your focus while you are engaged in an interaction with customers or members of your organization. For more information, see 8x8 Presence Sync: Sync your status between 8x8 Agent Workspace and Microsoft Teams.

What’s new for 8x8 Contact Center agents in June?

In this release of 8x8 Agent Workspace, we have introduced the following enhancements:

Updated text label for the agent icon

The text label when hovering over the agent icon in My assigned queues and Transfer panel has been updated to clearly indicate the number of agents enabled and logged in to a queue. Previously, when hovering over the agent icon, the text label only indicated the number of agents logged into the queue.

Depending on the queue, when hovering over the following icons, the following text may display:

  • Enabled and logged in to this queue : Indicates the number or agents that are enabled and logged in to the queue.
  • Agents enabled to this queue are not logged in : Indicates that currently, none of the agents that are enabled to serve the queue are logged in.
  • There are no agents enabled to this queue : Indicates that no agents are enabled to serve the queue.

Ability to add queues to favorites from the Transfer panel

When transferring to a queue, you can add queues to favorites. Click the icon to add or remove queues from your list of favorite queues. This options helps you organize your queues more efficiently to ensure you can quickly access frequently used queues without having to search for them.

To add a queue as a favorite from the Transfer panel:

  1. In 8x8 Agent Workspace, set your status to Available.
  2. When an interaction is offered, accept it.
  3. Inform the user of the transfer and click the Transfer icon.
  4. Select the Queues tab.
  5. Toggle the favorites icon On/Off. The icon changes to yellow when the queue is added as favorite.
  6. Click the queue to which you wish to transfer the interaction.
  7. Click Transfer.
  8. Click Continue to confirm the transfer.

For enhancements introduced prior to this release, see our content on previous releases.