Search / Reserve

This function allows you to search SMS/800 for available toll free numbers matching specified selection criteria and to reserve any or all of the numbers found.

In the menu frame, select the Search/Reserve link located in the Number Admin section of the menu. The following will appear in the workspace frame.

Two portions of this screen are controlled by Company Preferences. The first preference, ReserveCustNameRequired, determines whether or not the Customer Name, Billing Tel #, and Order #/Svc Req fields appear. The second preference, Search8fa, determines whether or not the 800ForAll fields appear. (See below for more information on the purpose of these 2 sections.) With both of these preferences turned off, the screen appears as shown below.

The Search/Reserve screen consists of two sections. The Search Criteria fields are used to indicate the type of number you are interested in, and the quantity you want. Reservation Data is the information to be associated with any numbers reserved.

Searches and reserves may be performed through to one of two different services:

The fields for searching, and what search engine uses each field, are described below.

Field	Description
Toll Free #	This field allows you to specify a particular toll free number, or to use wildcard characters to specify a pattern to be matched. Valid wildcards are numbers, letters, asterisks (to specify that any digit is acceptable) and ampersands (to specify that a digit must be the same as the other ampersands). Note that ampersands must be used in groups of two or more. This field is only used by SMS/800. The following is an example of a valid wildcard combination: 877&&&TREE. This combination would return numbers such as 877-555-8733, 877-333-8733, etc. If the specified count exceeds the possible amount of combinations that may occur, 8ms will automatically reduce the count to speed up response to the request. For example, a search of 800123456* has a maximum possible count of 10 (digits 0-9). If you enter this search pattern and provide a count of 100, 8ms will automatically change this count to 10.
NPA/NXX/Line	These fields are an alternative to the Toll Free Number field and provide a different form of searching. Only digits may be entered into the NPA, NXX and Line fields; wild cards are not allowed. Specifying an NPA means only look for numbers in this NPA. Specifying an NXX or Line means begin the search by looking for digits that exactly match each field. If the digits specified in these two fields are not found, SMS/800 looks for numbers greater than the digits specified for each field. These fields are only used by SMS/800. For example, specifying an NXX of 333 ensures that the NXX will be between 333 and 999; nothing lower than 333 will be returned. Specifying a Line of 4444 ensures that the Line will be between 4444 and 9999; nothing lower than 4444 will be returned. These fields may be combined to force a minimum value for each of the fields. For example, specifying an NXX of 583 and Line of 4567 ensures that all parts of the toll-free number will be equal to or greater than the specified value. Thus, this search might return 866-590-5300 but would not return 866-582-5300, since the NXX part is less than the specified NXX search value. You may use the Toll Free Number field OR the NPA/NXX/Line fields but may not use both.
Count	This field is used to specify the maximum number of toll free numbers to search for in SMS. This field is used by both SMS/800* and 800ForAll.*
Contiguous	When this checkbox is selected, SMS will return only toll free numbers which are contiguous. The length of the contiguous block is the value specified in the Count field. This field is used by both SMS/800* and 800ForAll.* If a pattern is given for a set of contiguous numbers, this is merely the starting point of the contiguous set and does not guarantee that all numbers will match this pattern. For example if you search for 10 contiguous numbers matching 800****2 and the first number returned is 800-555-0021, the last number will be 800-555-0030. This clearly does not match the pattern, but gives a contiguous set of 10 beginning with the matching pattern.
Contiguous Minimum	This field is valid only when the Contiguous checkbox is selected. If this field is blank, then the length of an available contiguous block must match the value in the Count or the request fails. If a value appears in Contiguous Minimum, then the request will succeed as long as the length is between the minimum and count. If a block of at least the minimum cannot be found, the request will fail. This field is used by both SMS/800* and 800ForAll.*
Area Code	Checking one or more toll-free area codes checkboxes limits the search to the selected area codes. Not checking any checkboxes is equivalent to checking the All checkbox. This field is only used by 800ForAll.
Number or Word	This field allows you to specify a specific toll-free number, a partial toll-free number, or a word. Any number of digits or letters from 1 to 7, or 10 if entering a toll-free NPA, may be entered. If exactly 10 digits are entered, the first 3 are deleted and the appropriate Area Code checkbox is then selected. Wildcards may be used to specify a pattern to be matched. Valid wildcards include the ones described in the Toll Free # field, above, plus an additional percent character, which behaves in a manner identical to the ampersand character. Thus, this field accepts numbers, letters, asterisks (to specify that any digit is acceptable), ampersands (to specify that a digit must be the same as the other ampersands), and percents (to specify that a digit must be the same as the other percents). Note that ampersands and percents must be used in groups of two or more. This field is only used by 800ForAll. Some examples of an 800ForAll search include **&%&% - matches numbers beginning with 3 digits, then digits 7 and 9 would be identical to one another while digits 8 and 10 would also be identical to one another, producing matches such as 800-123-4545, 855-483-6969, and 888-391-7272. grizzly* - matches any toll-free number that matches this string. See Positional Search and Trailing Digits, below, for additional information. 800grizzly - matches any toll-free number that begins with 800 and matches the reset of the string. See Positional Search and Trailing Digits, below, for additional information.
Positional Search	You may specify where a word should fit into a pattern by selecting one of the radio buttons labeled Starts With, Anywhere, and Ends With. Positional search does not include searching the 8 NPA, so the pattern is compared against digits 4-10. By default, Anywhere is checked. This indicates that any number containing the entered pattern will be shown. Selecting Starts With indicates that the number must begin with this string. Selecting Starts With** indicates that the number must end with this string. This field is only used by 800ForAll.
Trailing Digits	The Number or Word field can be allowed to match beyond the end of a toll-free number by specifying how many trailing digits are allowed to be part of the pattern. For example, searching for the pattern veteran may not be produce any matching numbers. By adding 1 or 2 trailing digits, the search may produce numbers such as 80012veteran. This field is only used by 800ForAll. If Trailing Digits is 0, 1 or 2 the search will return results that match up to the specified value. If Trailing Digits is blank, the search is first executed with a value of 0. If no results are returned then a second search is executed with a value of 2.
Create Number List	When this checkbox is selected, a number list will automatically be created which contains all the numbers located with a search. A separate list will be created that contains all the numbers successfully reserved. A name will automatically be assigned to the lists with the user ID and the date/time when the search or reserve succeeded. The list name is either of the form Search successes - SSSSS, or Reserve successes - SSSSS, where SSSSS is a unique identifier. This field is used by both SMS/800* and 800ForAll.*
Number List Name	As explained immediately above, a default name is created when creating a Number List. The Number List Name field allows you to override the default with your own list name. This field is used by both SMS/800* and 800ForAll.*
InterLATA Carrier	InterLATA carrier, sent in the SMS/800 iec field.

Once the selection criteria is specified, Reservation Data must be provided in the right hand column. The RespOrg, Contact Name, and Contact Phone indicate the owning RespOrg and a contact for the number. If the Company/User Preferences ReserveResporg, ContactName and ContactPhone have been set, these 3 fields will be populated with the preferences. See Search/Reserve Preferences for details on setting Company/User Preferences.

Several additional fields are available when reserving numbers, and are described below.

Field	Description
Notes	This is an optional field intended to provide an area for any notes to be stored with this number. This field is stored on SMS/800 and is associated with the number.
Customer Name	This is used for individual company auditing and tracking purposes, allowing a company to track what customer a number has been reserved for. This field will only appear if the ReserveCustNameRequired Company Preference is set. When it appears, it is a required field. This field is stored on 8MS only; it is not sent to SMS/800.
Billing Tel #	This is used in conjunction with the Customer Name field. It is used for individual company auditing and tracking purposes. This field will only appear if the ReserveCustNameRequired Company Preference is set. This field is stored on 8MS only; it is not sent to SMS/800.
Order #/Svc Req	This is also used in conjunction with the Customer Name field. It is used for individual company auditing and tracking purposes. This field will only appear if the ReserveCustNameRequired Company Preference is set. This field is stored on 8MS only; it is not sent to SMS/800.

Additionally, if you have permission, you may automatically activate any toll free numbers that are successfully reserved if the Activate checkbox is selected. This is discussed below.

Select the

button to begin the search. The response frame will display search results as soon as they are received, even if more results are still expected. A typical response to a search might look like this:

If your query is unable to find all the numbers that match your filter criteria, and you have contracted with 8MS for the 800ForAll add-on feature, you may see additional numbers listed. Such a response will appear as shown.

Each number that is returned is displayed as a checkbox. The numbers are sorted and grouped by NPA. Numbers are selected for reservation by having thier checkboxes checked. The buttons

and

are provided to respectively select and deselect all numbers in the result set. Each NPA group has buttons to select and deselect all numbers in the NPA.

The

button is displayed whenever more results are expected. Clicking it updates the response frame with the latest results. This button is not displayed if all results have been retrieved. Note that, if the Contiguous checkbox is checked, no results will be displayed until all results have been received.

Select the

button to reserve the selected numbers. You may do this any time after you have selected one or more numbers even if all the results have not been received. A message will appear in the response frame indicating the status of the request:

Use the Max Msgs per Hour field to limit the number of messages per hour being sent to SMS/800. This is intended to help you avoid exceeding the per Resp Org CPU percent allocation defined by SMS/800.

Use the Comments field to enter optional notes that will appear in the Batch Log.

The Run Date/Time field may be used to specify the date and time when the batch change will be sent. If left blank, the batch job will run ASAP.

Select the

button. The batch operation will be initiated and the Batch Popup is closed. Results of batch operations will appear on the Activity Log and Batch Log screens.

This function allows you to reserve toll free numbers without searching first. This option can be used if you require some amount of random toll-free numbers. The process of selected numbers by checkbox as described above is bypassed when reserving directly.

Fill in the Search Criteria and the Reservation Data as previously described. Click the

button. A message will appear in the response frame indicating the status of the request.

This function allows you to automatically activate any successfully reserved numbers.

If you have permission to automatically activate reserved numbers, two additional checkboxes will appear on the Search/Reserve screen: Activate and Use Defaults. Select the Activate checkbox. Now execute a Search or Reserve as you normally would. After selecting the Reserve button or the Reserve Selected #s (if doing a search and then reserve), this popup will appear.

Provide a Destination Date/Time when the records should activate on SMS/800.

Use the Batch Comments field to enter optional notes that will appear in the Batch Log.

Select the

button. When the numbers have been successfully reserved, a batch CopyRecord will be run. This may then be tracked as any other batch would, via the Batch Log or Activity Log.

If you expect to use this source 8MS Routing Set or toll-free number multiple times you may save this source as a default. To do so, after selecting your source, select the

button. Now, whenever you select the Use Defaults checkbox on the Search/Reserve screen, your default source will automatically be populated. If you do not want to use this default, leave the Use Defaults checkbox unselected and the Reserve and Batch Activate popup will not populate with the default source.

Note that the default source is saved per user. If you would like this default to be a company-wide default, please contact 8MS support.

This function allows you to attempt to reserve a list of particular toll free numbers.

Enter the Reservation Data as described above. Select the

button. The following pop-up window will appear:

Use the Comments field to enter optional notes that will appear in the Batch Log.

The Run Date/Time field may be used to specify the date and time when the batch change will be sent. If left blank, the batch job will run ASAP.

Select the

button. The batch operation will be initiated and the Batch Popup is closed. Results of batch operations will appear on the Activity Log and Batch Log screens.