Best practices for time and date condition in rule building

Time and date conditions help you define the specific days, dates, and time intervals during which a rule must apply. Review the following important notes before you begin creating call rules using the time and date condition:

Use alongside other call rule conditions

Time and date conditions do not replace the other time zone-based dialing controls such as Automatic time zone mapping and Contactable time sets. Use the time and date condition as an additional layer of checks with more granular control.

For example, you require the callable window for all outbound calls in the United States to start at 8:00 AM local time, except the state of California. For the state of California, the callable window start time must be set to 9:00 AM, local time. To define this call rule, use the following dialing controls:

  1. Use the Automatic time zone mapping to define the callable window for the whole of the United States. 
  2. Use the time and date condition to state that if the time is earlier than 9:00 AM PST, AND column ‘State’ has a value CA, apply the action Do Not Dial. This condition ensures that the California contacts are not dialed before 9:00 AM.
  3. Run a Campaign Recycle later than 9:00 AM PST to evaluate and dial the skipped California contacts.

Note of caution if used in isolation

When the time and date-based conditions are used in isolation and not alongside the other call rule conditions, the conditions apply to all contacts in a campaign once the specified date or time condition is met. This may lead to unnecessary delays in campaign execution.

For example, if a pre-call rule only with time and date-based condition states: If the time is earlier than 10:00 AM, apply the action Do Not Dial.

  1. This time and date condition prevents the campaign from dialing any contacts before 10:00 AM.
  2. Also, the campaign may not dial even after 10:00 AM. If all contacts are processed before 10:00 AM, you will require a campaign recycle to evaluate and dial the contacts again.

Genesys therefore recommends that you combine time and date conditions with other conditions such as Contact List Column. For example, in the preceding rule, you can set the call rule as “If the time is earlier than 10 AM AND column ‘A’ has value ‘XYZ’, apply the action Do Not Dial.” This call rule applies to a targeted subset of contacts in the campaign. You can create further subsets within the column A by adding more rules.