Integrating with phone

Set up the integration

You must have Manager role access to the instance and Viewer role access to the resource group to complete setup. For more information about access levels, see Managing access.

To set up the integration:

1. In the Integrations section on the main page for your assistant under Essential Channels, you will see a tile for Phone.

2. On the Phone tile, click Add.

3. On the pop-up window, click Add again.

4. Choose whether to generate a free phone number for your assistant, integrate with your contact center, or connect to an existing SIP trunk:

   • To generate a free phone number for your assistant, click Generate a free phone number.

     Generating a free phone number is supported only for watsonx Assistant instances in the Dallas and Washington DC data centers.

   • To integrate with a contact center, click Integrate with your contact center.

   • To use an existing phone number you have already configured with a SIP trunk provider, click Use an existing phone number with an external provider.

   Click Next.

5. If you are integrating with a contact center, follow the instructions to configure the contact center. Skip this step if you are generating a free phone number.

   1. On the Select contact center page, select the tile of the connect center you would like to use.

   2. On the Connect to contact center page, enter the required information. There is a Test Connection button on the page to validate the connection. Click Next.

6. If you are using an existing phone number, follow the instructions to configure the SIP trunk. Skip this step if you are generating a free phone number.

   1. On the Bring your own SIP trunk page, copy the SIP URI and assign it to your SIP trunk. Click Next.

7. On the Phone number page (only for Integrate with your contact center and Use an existing phone number with an external provider), specify the phone number of the SIP trunk. Specify the number by using the international phone number format: +1 958 555 0123. Do not surround the area code with parentheses.

   Currently, only one primary phone number can be added during initial setup of the phone integration. You can add more phone numbers in the phone integration settings later.

   Click Next.

8. On the Speech to Text page, select the instance of the Speech to Text service you want to use for the phone integration.

   • If you have existing Speech to Text instances, select the instance you want to use from the list.

   • If you do not have any existing Speech to Text instances, click Create new instance to create a new Plus instance.

9. In the Choose your Speech to Text language model field, select the language model you want to use.

   The list of language models is automatically filtered to use the same language as your assistant. To see all language models, toggle the Filter models based on assistant language switch to Off.

   If you created specialized custom models that you want your assistant to use, choose the Speech to Text service instance that hosts the custom models now, and you can configure your assistant to use them later. The Speech to Text service instance must be hosted in the same location as your watsonx Assistant service instance. For more information, see Using a custom language model.

   For more information about language models, see Languages and models in the Speech to Text documentation.

   Click Next.

10. On the Text to Speech page, select the instance of the Text to Speech service you want to use for the phone integration.

    • If you have existing Text to Speech instances, select the instance you want to use from the list.

    • If you do not have any existing Text to Speech instances, click Create new instance to create a new Standard instance.

11. In the Choose your Text to Speech voice field, select the voice you want to use.

    The list of voices is automatically filtered to use the same language as your assistant. To see all voices, toggle the Filter voices based on assistant language switch to Off.

    For more information about voice options, and to listen to audio samples, see Languages and voices in the Text to Speech documentation.

    Click Next.

Any speech service charges incurred by the phone integration are billed with the watsonx Assistant service plan as voice add-on charges. After the instances are created, you can access them directly from the IBM Cloud dashboard. Any use of speech instances that occurs outside of your assistant is charged separately as speech service usage costs.

The phone integration setup is now complete. On the Phone page, you can click the tabs to view or edit the phone integration.

If you chose to generate a free telephone number, your new number is displayed on the Phone number tab immediately. However, provisioning the new number might take several minutes.

Adding more phone numbers

If you are using existing phone numbers you configured via a SIP trunk provider, you can add multiple numbers to the same phone integration.

If you generated a free phone number, you cannot add more numbers.

To add more phone numbers:

1. In the phone integration settings, go to the Phone number tab.

2. Use one of the following methods:

   • To add phone numbers one by one, click Add phone number in the table, and enter the phone number along with an optional description. Click the Add button to save the number.

   • To import a set of phone numbers that are stored in a comma-separated values (CSV) file, click the Upload a CSV file icon (![Add phone number][images/phone-integ-import-number.png]), and then find the CSV file that contains the list of phone numbers.

     The phone numbers you upload will replace any existing numbers in the table.

Setting up live agent escalation

If you want your assistant to be able to transfer a conversation to a live agent, you can connect your phone integration to a contact center. For more information, see instructions for the supported platform:

• Genesys
• Twilio Flex

Phone integration limits

Any speech service charges incurred by the phone integration are included as Voice add-on charges in your watsonx Assistant service plan usage. The Voice add-on use is charged separately and in addition to your service plan charges.

Plan usage is measured based on the number of monthly active users, where a user is identified by the caller's unique phone number. An MD5 hash is applied to the phone number and the 128-bit hash value is used for billing purposes.

The number of concurrent calls that your assistant can participate in at one time depends on your plan type.