# Distinctive Caller ID Name Overview

Distinctive Caller ID Name gives your team more context on an incoming call than a bare phone number. This page explains what the feature does and walks through a worked example.

## What Distinctive Caller ID Name does

When a call comes in, Cloud Voice assembles a caller ID name that tells the employee both who is calling and how the call was routed to them. The result is a single string shown on the phone, built from the sources below. Cloud Voice checks each source in order and includes whichever names are available, from highest priority to lowest:

1. **Contact name**: the name saved for that number in the Company Contacts directory or the extension's Personal Contacts directory.

   :::note
   A Company Contacts name only appears if the extension user is allowed to view Company Contacts. If they lack that permission, the stored contact name is not shown on their phone.
   :::

2. **Call feature name**: the name of the IVR (Interactive Voice Response, the automated menu that answers and routes calls), Ring Group, Queue, or Call Flow the call passed through.

   :::note
   When a call travels through more than one call feature before reaching the extension, only the last feature's name is used. For example, if a call hits an IVR and is then sent to a queue, agents see the queue name.
   :::

3. **Trunk DID/DDI name**: the name you assigned to the phone number the caller dialed. DID (Direct Inward Dialing) is that specific inbound number; DDI (Direct Dialing In) is the same thing named outside North America.

4. **Caller Name (CNAM)**: the caller's name or company name delivered with the call.

   :::note
   CNAM is set on the caller's side, not within Cloud Voice.
   :::

If none of these names are available for a call, no caller ID name is displayed.

## Example

Suppose your company runs a support team that handles customers in both China and America, and you want agents to instantly recognize which region a caller belongs to. You configure the following on your system:

**Queue**

A queue named `Support` for the support team.

**SIP trunk**

A SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) trunk with two DID numbers, each tied to its own name:

| DID Number | DID Name |
| ---------- | -------- |
| 1258888    | China    |
| 1256666    | America  |

:::tip
Give each DID a name that maps to a region, department, or campaign (like `China` and `America` here). Agents then see at a glance which number a caller dialed, without having to memorize the DID numbers themselves.
:::

You also keep these two entries in the Company Contacts directory:

| Name  | Phone Number |
| ----- | ------------ |
| Sunmy | 5502222      |
| Becky | 5503333      |

When customers dial one of the DID numbers and land in the Support queue, agents see a caller ID name assembled in this order:

`{contact_name}: {queue_name}: {trunk_did_name}: {caller_name}`

Only the parts that have a value appear, so the display varies from call to call:

- Becky dials **1258888** to reach the support team and sends no Caller Name. Agents see **Becky: Support: China**.
- Sunmy dials **1256666** to reach the support team and sends no Caller Name. Agents see **Sunmy: Support: America**.
- An unknown customer dials **1258888** to reach the support team and their carrier sends the Caller Name **Acme**. Because the number is not in your contacts, agents see **Support: China: Acme**.