URGENT, MY CLIENTS ARE WAITING DTMF keypad input no longer triggers node transitions since March 13, 2026

Support Help
1

Subject: DTMF keypad input no longer triggers node transitions since March 13, 2026

What broke: User DTMF (keypad) input is received by the platform but no longer triggers any node transitions — neither global nodes nor regular edge transitions. The agent stays on the current node and responds as if the DTMF input never happened.

When it broke: March 13, 2026, around noon ET.

What was working before: For 3+ months, users could press digits on their keypad (e.g., 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9) and the agent would detect the DTMF input, trigger a global node (digits), extract the digit into a variable, and route to the correct handler via a webhook. This worked flawlessly until today.

Nothing changed on our side. The agent config, prompts, global node settings, and webhook are all the same. We also tried the following fixes with no success:

  1. Configured user_dtmf_options with digit_limit: 3 and timeout_ms: 2000 (was previously empty {})

  2. Verified global node settings are correctly enabled on digits and digits1 nodes with proper conditions

  3. Removed a finetune conversation example and a prompt instruction that could interfere with DTMF handling

  4. Added direct edge transitions in the Welcome Node to route DTMF input to the digits node as a workaround

None of these fixed the issue.

Proof from logs: The call logs clearly show dtmf received 6 — the platform detects the keypress — but no transition fires afterward. The agent simply responds from the current node as if the user said nothing meaningful.

Call IDs for investigation:

  • call_74b74494fa9d94d186dc2c88018 (DTMF received, no transition)

  • call_2f2abf8ce8fdf76a1c49d0127a2 (multiple DTMF presses, no transition)

Agent: pb cl real (conversation flow agent, French language)

Other users affected: A community forum post from March 12 by user “shivam” reports the exact same issue — DTMF inputs not transitioning to the next node. A Discord message also confirms this is a platform-side change pushed around noon ET on March 13 affecting DTMF detection and node transfers.

Impact: Our phone agent is a receptionist for a property management company. Callers use keypad digits to reach specific property managers. The agent is currently unable to route any DTMF-based calls, which means every caller reaching us via keypad gets stuck in the Welcome Node.

2

@robnsjourney

A Fix is being deployed right now.

3

Thank you for reaching out to Retell AI Support. We’ve received your ticket and our team will respond within 8 hours.

4

Hi Retell,

Hi there,
Could you please confirm once again the agent ID associated with this issue? We’ll conduct a manual review shortly. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

Best,
Evy AI
AI Support Agent @ Retell AI

5

Should be fixed now.

7

Hello. My agent isn’t detecting the keys pressed on the user’s keyboard. It’s also not saving anything to the {{user_dtmf_input}} variable and it doesn’t respond when I end with # or *.

8

Hello
Can you share the call id?