Connect your Twilio account

ContactRoll places and takes phone calls through your organization's own Twilio account. Twilio bills that account for every call. This article walks an Owner or Administrator through connecting it.

You need the permission the Roles page calls "Connect Twilio, check or disconnect it, send a number's calls here, and set the month's calling minutes". Owners and Administrators hold it.

Before you start, in Twilio's console

The Calling page lists these under Before the first call, each with a link to Twilio's own page.

• Use a full Twilio account. A trial account calls only numbers it has verified and plays a trial message to the person called. Upgrading to a paid Twilio account
• Set up a compliance profile if Twilio asks for one. Twilio calls it a regulatory bundle, and in some countries it asks for one before it sells the account a number. Twilio's regulatory compliance
• Turn on each country you call in the account's voice geographic permissions. Twilio dials only the countries turned on there. Voice geographic permissions
• Buy at least one phone number that can take voice calls.
• Make a Standard API key, and copy its secret right away: Twilio shows the secret only once. Making an API key in Twilio's console

Connect Twilio

• Open Settings, then Calling. On a phone, Settings is under More.
• Under Connect Twilio, paste the Account SID (it starts AC), the API key SID (it starts SK) and the API key secret.
• Press Connect Twilio.

ContactRoll checks the key with Twilio and seals the secret. Connecting changes nothing in your Twilio account. If something is off, the page says why in a sentence, for example when a SID has the wrong shape or Twilio refuses the key.

The form takes an API key and its secret. A Standard key is all ContactRoll needs. If you connect a Main key, it works too, and the page tells you what more that key can do.

Make the TwiML App

Under Set up in the Twilio account, press Make the TwiML App. It tells Twilio to ask ContactRoll where each call goes. It is the only thing ContactRoll makes in your Twilio account, it costs nothing at Twilio, and it stays in the account if you ever disconnect.

Choose the number calls are placed from

Under The number calls are placed from, press Call from this number beside the number the people you call should see. The chosen number is marked "calls are placed from this one". If the account has no number yet, the page says to buy one in Twilio's console.

Set the month's minutes

Under This month’s minutes, type Minutes a month (0 to 1,000,000) and press Save. Every organization starts with a cap of 1,000 minutes, and Use everybody’s cap goes back to it.

• Each call counts in whole minutes, rounded up.
• The month is the calendar month in your organization's time zone.
• Once the cap is reached, calls placed from ContactRoll wait until the month ends or the minutes are raised.
• Calls that come in are always put through. If they carry the month past the cap, Settings, Calling says so, and each member who may raise the minutes gets a task.

Prices

At the bottom of the page, What Twilio charges lists Twilio's published US prices and the day they were read. A call from the browser to a phone is two of those prices: the browser's minute and the call's. While a call is up, the bar shows Twilio's published price a minute for numbers starting +1, and counts calls to other countries in minutes.

The money ContactRoll shows is an estimate before any discount or tax. Your Twilio bill is the actual charge.

Twilio's signature (optional)

Twilio signs each request it sends with your account's Auth Token. To have ContactRoll check that every request really comes from Twilio, give the Auth Token in the Twilio's signature step on the Calling page. ContactRoll keeps it sealed and uses it only to check those signatures. Every request ContactRoll makes to Twilio still uses your API key. The page shows when the signature has been checked on a real call, and you can remove the token there at any time.

If you change the Auth Token in Twilio later, give the new one here as well. Until you do, calls are refused, and the Calling page says so with the time of the last refusal.

Check the connection

Under The connection, look for "Ready: calls are placed from …". If it reads "Not ready to call yet.", the sentence after it says what is still missing.

Next, decide what a call to each of your numbers does, and switch recording on if you want it. See the articles on phone number setup and on call recordings.

Later on

• Check the key asks Twilio again. Use it when the connection is marked needs attention. When the key works, the page says "Twilio answered: the key works."
• To use a different key, press Disconnect…, then Disconnect Twilio, and connect the new key. After connecting again, press Make the TwiML App again (ContactRoll finds the one it made), choose the number calls are placed from, and switch recording back on if you use it.
• Buying numbers, upgrading the account, compliance profiles and the countries you may call are all managed in Twilio's console.