Collect data with the phone keypad so policy and ID numbers arrive exactly right

When someone talks to your voice agent, the agent turns what it hears into text. That's called transcription, and with ordinary sentences it works very well. A long number rattled off in one go is a different story, because a six and a seven get mixed up and a digit gets lost in street noise.

Collecting data with the keypad means letting the caller type that number on their phone instead of reading it out. Each key plays its own tone, technically called a DTMF tone, which travels separately from the voice. There's nothing to interpret, so it arrives exactly as pressed.

Picture an insurance broker. A customer calls to report a claim and the agent asks for their policy number, which has eight digits. The customer says "I'll type it in, nobody ever gets it right over the phone", keys it in, and the agent replies "Got it, tell me what happened to the car". Nobody had to repeat a single digit.

Getting the details that go wrong most often over the phone right the first time, such as a policy number, an ID number, a case number or a customer reference.

Shorter calls. A misheard number means reading it back, fixing it and confirming it again. Typed in, it's pressed once and done.

Menus your agent can understand, like "press 1 to report a claim or 2 for a new policy". And the reverse, letting your agent get through another company's automated menu when it's the one making the call.

The checkbox lives in your agent's flow, which is its step-by-step script. Each step is called a node. If your agent uses a single prompt, with all its instructions in one text, see the first question in the FAQ.

Open your agent in Agents, go into its flow and find the Extract data node that collects the number. It's the step that saves the details from the call.

Under Data to extract, each item has a name, like policy_number. Tick "can be typed on the keypad" on the one you want.

If the number is always the same length, enter it in "digits", for example 8 for the policy number. If it's a phone number, tick "is a phone number" and Lera checks the length for the country.

Under Voice & pacing, inside Fine voice settings, you'll find Phone keypad. "Accept keys pressed by the caller" is already on, so usually there's nothing to change.

Save, publish and call it yourself. Read the number out wrong on purpose and you'll hear the agent offer the keypad.

With the box ticked, if the item isn't understood when spoken, or if the customer prefers, the agent offers the keypad. What's typed doesn't go through the agent. Lera saves it straight into its field.

What does get checked is the shape. If you set 8 digits and the customer types 7, it isn't saved and the agent asks again.

The entry closes when the caller stops pressing for about two and a half seconds, and every key restarts the count. That way, someone calmly reading the digits off a document isn't cut off halfway. If you'd rather it ended with the hash key, ask Maite, the panel's assistant.

For a List of options item, a key counts by its position. With the options "claim, new policy", 1 is claim and 2 is new policy. A Yes or no item can't be typed.

When your agent calls another company and an automated menu answers, technically called an IVR, add the Press keys node to the flow at that point. In Keys, enter the ones to press, for example 2. Digits, star and hash all work, and a w adds half a second of pause.

By default it waits one second before pressing, because many menus speak slowly. If you leave Keys blank, the agent picks them by listening to the menu, which is slower and less reliable. If the menu never changes, type the keys in.

A single-prompt agent has no nodes. Under Voice & pacing, tick "The agent can press keys" and it will decide when to do it.

A keypad only has numbers, star and hash. If an ID or reference includes letters, ask for those by voice in a separate item.

Keys are a phone thing. A call made from your website has no keypad.

If the customer starts typing while the agent is talking, the agent finishes its sentence. If you'd rather it stopped at the first key, tick "Starting to type interrupts the agent".

In the call history, a single key is shown as is, because it's usually a menu choice. From two digits up, it only records that digits were typed and how many, because a PIN can also come in through the keypad. The number itself only goes into its field.

Typing guarantees the number is the one the customer pressed, not that it exists. To check it in your management software, you need a function that asks it.

If you're on a plan, flows and the keypad come with all of them. Connecting your agent to your software, and outbound calls, which is where Press keys is usually needed, start from the Professional plan.

What if my agent uses a single prompt instead of a flow? The keys still reach it, exactly as pressed, as part of the conversation. What the flow checkbox adds is saving them straight into their field, without the agent having to copy them.

Is the ID number written in the call history? No. It only records that it was typed and how many digits it had. The number goes into its field, which is where you need it.

How much does it cost to try? €20 free credit, no card needed. Mark an item as "can be typed on the keypad", call your agent and type in your own number.