Managing Locations

A location is a collection of settings that allow you to divide the voice mail system into separate virtual units, such that a mailbox in one location cannot access (i.e., transfer to or send messages to) a mailbox that is in a different location (unless those locations are shared).  While most applications will only need a single location, the multiple location feature facilitates any situation in which there are two or more "businesses" sharing a PBX.

Both mailboxes and ports are assigned to a location.  When a port is assigned to a location, all calls to that port can access only mailboxes that also belong to that location.  Likewise, if a caller is in a given mailbox, he or she can only access (i.e., go to or transfer to) mailboxes that are in the same location as the current mailbox.

By default, all ports and all mailboxes are assigned to the predefined location called Default Location.  To split a VMS between two or more businesses without dividing up the voice ports, you can create your separate locations and share all of them with Default Location.  Mailboxes for business 1 can be assigned to location 1, mailboxes for business 2 can be assigned to location 2, and so forth.  This allows calls to any of the businesses to arrive on any of the voice ports and still be kept separate from (or ignorant of) the mailboxes and extensions assigned to the other businesses.

In this scenario, it is important that you keep all the voice ports assigned to Default Location and that you share all the new locations with Default Location (but not with each other).  If you do not share them with Default Location, callers will not be able to transfer to mailboxes in those locations.  See the section on Sharing locations for more information.

The location Default Location was set up during installation.  It is automatically assigned default system mailboxes (991 for greetings and auto attendant and 0 for the operator).  These can be changed, if desired, by editing the location.