# Calling & telephony


# Calling & telephony

The **Calling** tab decides how your agent is used on the phone — whether it answers incoming calls, makes outgoing ones, or both — and the guardrails around each call. Set this in the agent builder at **/agent/setup**. Voice Portal handles the underlying telephony, so you configure behavior, not infrastructure.

## Inbound and outbound

![The Calling tab](/img/screenshots/portal/agent-calling.png)
*The Calling tab: inbound and outbound calling, maximum call duration, auto-hangup, and call-transfer settings.*

Choose how the agent operates:

- **Inbound** — the agent answers calls that come in. Pair it with a phone number so callers reach it directly.
- **Outbound** — the agent places calls, typically driven by a [campaign](../campaigns) or a bulk-call action from [Contacts](../contacts).

An agent can be set up for inbound, outbound, or both, depending on your use case.

:::note

Inbound agents need a number to answer on. Manage and buy numbers under **/phone** — see [Phone numbers](../phone-numbers).

:::

## Maximum call duration

Set a **maximum duration** to cap how long any single call can run. The call ends when it reaches the limit. This protects against calls that stall or run away, and keeps usage predictable.

## Auto-hangup

Enable **auto-hangup** so the agent ends the call cleanly when the conversation is genuinely over, rather than holding the line. This keeps lines free and avoids awkward dead air at the end of a call.

## Assigned numbers and webhooks

The Calling tab is also where you **assign phone numbers** to the agent (and unassign them), and where you set **webhooks** that fire on call events — **call started**, **call ended** and **transcript ready** — so your systems can react in real time.

## Call transfer

When a call needs a human, the agent can hand off the live call. Transfer is **not** configured on this tab — you set it up as the **Transfer Call** built-in function in the **Tools** tab (and as the Transfer step in the Workflow Builder), reached from [Tools](./tools-mcp). It has two parts:

- **Transfer destination** — where the call goes. This is either a **phone number** or a **queue**, written as `queue:<name>` (for example `queue:sales`).
- **Announce message** — an optional line the agent speaks just before connecting, so the caller knows they're being transferred.

Set a phone number for a direct handoff, or a queue to route into a team. Add an announce message when you want the caller to hear a brief heads-up before the connection.

:::tip[Tell the agent when to transfer]

Pair transfer with a clear line in your [system prompt](./overview) (on the Agent tab) telling the agent exactly when to escalate. The agent only transfers well if it knows the trigger.

:::

## Next steps

- [Buy and manage phone numbers](../phone-numbers)
- [Run an outbound campaign](../campaigns)
- [Bulk-call your contacts](../contacts)
- [Configure the Transfer Call function in Tools](./tools-mcp)