Trigger: Call Received

The Call received trigger fires the instant an inbound call starts ringing, before anyone answers it. It's the earliest hook available — useful for reacting as fast as possible, e.g. logging in real time that a call is in progress.

When to use it

• Show in a Team channel who's calling right now, so any free agent can pick it up.
• Create the contact record in the CRM as soon as the call comes in, even before it's answered.
• Fire a webhook to an external system (e.g. a CTI or desktop pop-up) the moment the phone rings.

Trigger settings

• Specific channel: the standard call filter.
• Direction: ⚠️ this trigger is only ever generated for inbound calls — picking "Outbound" means the trigger will never fire, with no warning. Leave the filter on "Inbound" or empty.

Available variables

Standard call and contact variables, plus:

• $is_new_contact — true when the number had no Contact row before this call.

Steps

1. Create or open an automation.
2. Drag "Call received" from Call triggers.
3. Filter by channel if needed; don't pick "Outbound" in Direction (see warning above).
4. Connect an action, e.g. "Notify the team".
5. Activate and save.

Example

You want the team to see in the "Calls" Team channel who's calling in real time. Connect "Notify the team" with: "📞 Inbound call from {{$contact.display_name}} ({{$call.from}}) on {{$channel.name}}."

Tips

• If you only want to react once an agent actually answers (not just when it rings), use the "Call answered" trigger instead.
• Pair it with "First call from contact" (via $is_new_contact) to give new leads special treatment from the very first second.

Troubleshooting

If you set the Direction filter to Outbound and the workflow never runs: that's expected, this trigger (and the ones that share its base event: "First call from contact", "Repeat caller", and "Call outside business hours") is only ever generated for inbound calls.