VICIdial Admin Guide: Managing Your Call Center System

Getting the most out of VICIdial isn’t about the install — it’s about day-to-day admin hygiene. This guide walks through the seven admin areas that actually matter for running a healthy call center: campaigns, agents, lists, in-groups, reports, system config, and carriers.

Accessing the VICIdial Admin Interface

The admin interface is at http://your-server/vicidial/admin.php. Credentials are the same as your VICIdial user login; access level is controlled by User Level:

• Level 1 — standard agent (no admin access)
• Level 7 — supervisor (reports, listen-in, pause agents)
• Level 8 — admin (campaign and user management)
• Level 9 — super-admin (full system access including carriers and settings)

Most daily admin work happens at level 8. Level 9 is reserved for system-wide configuration and should be given sparingly.

Managing Campaigns: Creation, Editing, and Monitoring

The Campaigns section is where outbound dialing lives. Key tabs inside an existing campaign:

• Main campaign settings — dial method, dial level, call time
• Lists — which lists are assigned and active
• Agent settings — which user groups can join, auto-dial options
• Scripts — link to dynamic agent scripts
• Dispositions — which status codes are available
• Pause Codes — reasons agents can pause (bathroom, training, etc.)
• AMD settings — answering machine detection rules

Pause the campaign before making major changes (like switching dial methods) to avoid affecting in-flight calls. Most other edits take effect immediately.

Real-time monitoring for active campaigns is under Reports > Real-Time Campaign Summary. Watch these metrics live:

• Active calls — current in-flight dials
• Waiting for agent — parked calls risking abandonment
• Abandonment rate — must stay under 3% (TCPA)
• Dial level — adaptive target
• Agent counts — active, pause, dead

For campaign creation specifics, see our VICIdial campaign setup walkthrough.

Agent Management: Adding Users, Setting Permissions

Users live at Admin > Users. Each user has:

• User / Pass — login credentials
• User Level — 1/7/8/9 as above
• User Group — permission bucket controlling campaign and in-group access
• Phone Login — default phone assignment (optional; agents can override at login)
• Agent Admin Log — whether agent actions are logged

User Groups are where granular permissions are set. A User Group controls:

• Which campaigns members can join
• Which in-groups they can accept calls from
• Which scripts are available
• Whether they can modify leads
• Whether they see other agents’ stats

Typical setup: one user group per team (e.g., “Insurance - Medicare”, “Insurance - Health”), with campaign and in-group permissions matched to each team’s workload.

Lead List Management: Upload, Assign, and Recycle

Lists are containers for leads. Admin > Lists shows all lists with counts, status, and campaign assignment.

Creating a list — Set List ID, name, description, associated campaign. Status Y = active.

Loading leads — Lists > Load New Leads. Accept CSV files with phone_number required. VICIdial scrubs against DNC and dedupes as part of load.

Recycling leads — Over time, lists accumulate leads with specific dispositions (no-answer, busy, voicemail). Recycle settings control which dispositions get dialed again and how soon. Configure carefully to avoid over-calling.

Purging — Old or exhausted lists can be archived via List Delete/Purge. Keep dispositioned data for compliance (typically 2-7 years depending on vertical).

Hopper — VICIdial’s dial hopper is the short-term queue of leads ready to dial. If the hopper is empty, no dials happen. Check Real-Time report if agents are idle despite a loaded list.

Reports and Real-Time Statistics in VICIdial

VICIdial has dozens of reports out of the box. The ones that matter most day-to-day:

Real-time reports:

• Real-Time Campaign Summary — live campaign health
• Real-Time Agent Activity — who’s on calls, paused, idle
• Real-Time In-Group Summary — inbound queue health

Historical reports:

• Daily Report — calls, contacts, dispositions per day
• Campaign Detail Report — per-campaign performance
• Agent Performance Detail — per-agent stats
• Time Sheet Report — logged agent hours
• Dial Statistics — dial attempts broken down by disposition

Compliance reports:

• Call Report — every call with timestamps, duration, disposition
• DNC report — numbers added/removed from DNC
• Recording Lookup — pull recordings by lead, agent, or date

All reports can be filtered by date range, campaign, user, or in-group. Many also export to CSV for BI or audit.

VICIdial System Configuration: Key Settings

The System Settings section (level 9 only) controls system-wide behavior:

• Default call recording — on/off, format (wav vs mp3), retention
• Webroot — which URL to use for admin and agent interfaces
• Session timeout — how long inactive logins persist
• Login lockout — failed-attempt protection
• Allowed IPs — restrict admin access by network
• Agent screen refresh rate — typically 3-5 seconds

System Settings also controls the default behavior that’s inherited by campaigns. Changes here affect every new campaign created afterward.

Carrier and Trunk Configuration

Admin > Carriers is where SIP trunks are configured. Each carrier has:

• Carrier ID and Name
• Dialplan Entry — Asterisk dialplan snippet that routes outbound calls
• Registration Entry — SIP credentials (if carrier requires registration)
• Protocol — usually SIP, sometimes IAX2
• Active — Y to enable

Most issues with inbound or outbound calling trace back to carrier configuration. Test carriers with test calls before putting real campaigns on them.

Backups and Maintenance

Admin-side maintenance tasks worth doing regularly:

• Database backups — nightly mysqldump of the asterisk database, stored off-server
• Recording archival — rsync recordings to S3, Wasabi, or tape for compliance
• Log rotation — verify /var/log is not filling up
• List cleanup — purge exhausted lists after compliance retention expires
• User audits — disable accounts for ex-employees promptly

Our managed VICIdial hosting handles all of this automatically — backups, recording archival, log rotation, and patching — so admin time can focus on running the business.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I access the VICIdial admin panel? Navigate to /vicidial/admin.php at your server’s hostname or IP. Log in with a VICIdial user account that has User Level 7 or higher (level 8+ for most admin tasks, level 9 for system settings).

How do I add a new agent in VICIdial? In the admin interface, go to Admin > Users > Add a New User. Fill in the User, Password, Full Name, User Level (1 for standard agent), and User Group. Save. Also create a Phone record under Admin > Phones if the agent needs a dedicated extension.

Can VICIdial record all calls automatically? Yes. Recording can be enabled per campaign (campaign settings > Recording) or system-wide (System Settings > Default Recording). Format is typically WAV; MP3 is available if LAME is installed. Recordings are stored in /var/spool/asterisk/monitor and can be archived to external storage.

How do I view real-time agent activity in VICIdial? Go to Reports > Real-Time Agent Activity. This shows every logged-in agent, their current status (call, pause, wait), their current campaign, and the current call duration. Supervisors can listen-in, barge, or monitor from this screen.

What reports does VICIdial generate? VICIdial includes dozens of reports: Daily Report, Campaign Detail, Agent Performance, Time Sheet, Dial Statistics, Call Report, In-Group Report, and many more. All can be filtered by date, campaign, user, or in-group, and most export to CSV.

Ready for Managed VICIdial Admin?

If day-to-day admin is eating your time, our managed VICIdial hosting handles routine maintenance, backups, and updates. For help with specific admin configuration, our VICIdial support team covers both hosted and self-hosted VICIdial customers — reach out through the contact page.