Using Contact Center Chat with Skype for Business

With the addition of Microsoft Skype for Business Server agents and supervisors employees use Skype for Business as their default instant messaging client. The presence of all company employees is natively delivered in Contact Center Client. Contact center employees can view the presence of both internal and external contacts to determine if they are available to communicate. In addition to Available, Offline, and Away, employees see In a Meeting, Busy, In a call, Do Not Disturb, Be Right Back, and other Skype for Business presence indicators.

Note:

In order to use Contact Center Chat with Skype for Business, you must enable Contact Center Chat and have Skype for Business open and running.

If an agent views an employee on a real-time monitor and notes the employee is online, the agent can right-click the employee and send an instant message.

The following table provides details on the presence indicators that are available when Contact Center Client is used in conjunction with Skype for Business Client and Contact Center Chat with Skype for Business.

Table 1. Skype for Business presence indicator icons
2013 Presence Icon (Large)	2013 Presence Icon (Small)	Status Text	Description
		Available	The contact is online and can participate in interactions. Users can manually set this status, but the next automatic state change will override this setting.
		Busy	The contact is available, but is engaged by another activity. Busy contacts will not be routed ACD calls, but may receive Non ACD calls. Possible activities include the following: In a Call—the contact is in a phone, voice, or video interaction. In a Meeting—the Outlook calendar shows that the contact has a scheduled meeting. Users can manually set this status.
		Do Not Disturb	The contact is engaged by another activity and is unavailable. Contacts in Do Not Disturb will neither receive ACD or Non ACD calls. Users can manually set this status.
		Away / Inactive Be Right Back Off;Work	The contact is likely unavailable. Possible reasons include the following: The contact’s computer has been idle for more than the away time period setting (5 minutes by default). Note: By default, the transition from Available to Inactive occurs after 5 minutes. Then, after five more minutes, the status changes to Away if there is still no activity on the computer. The contact’s Outlook calendar or Out of Office Assistant indicates that they are out of the office. The contact is temporarily unavailable Note: As soon as activity is detected on the contact’s computer, Ignite automatically resets the presence status to the appropriate state. The contact has locked their computer. The contact has manually set their presence to Away or Be Right Back. Users can manually set this status.
		Away / Inactive Be Right Back Off;Work	Note: When a user manually sets themselves as Away, they are still available to receive calls, such as from a transfer.
		Offline	The contact is not available. Possible reasons for this include the following: The contact has manually set their presence status to Appear Offline. The contact has not signed into Skype for Business. The contact has blocked you from seeing their presence status. Skype for Business is not running on the contact’s computer.
		Presence unknown	Skype for Business cannot determine the status of the contact. This status is typically displayed because the contact’s presence status is unavailable to Skype for Business, such as for a contact who is part of an organization that is not a federated partner.

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