Staff are encouraged to develop a relationship over the phone, not deal with queries as quickly as possible and meet a daily sales target. Dialogue and a relaxed attitude help to build customer confidence. The 90-strong call centre, which handles an average of 5000 customer enquiries a day, utilises intelligent call routing to queue callers and direct calls to the relevant customer service specialist, as soon as one is free. This has eliminated the problem of frustrating engaged signals, reduced the number of lost calls and eased the pressure on the main switchboard. Most important, it has raised levels of customer satisfaction.
Information is the key to success.
A Siemens CallScan system, working in tandem with Automatic Call Distribution, provides up to date information on the number of calls, the number of operators free and other vital data. Call centre managers can then improve resource allocation and deal with problems efficiently before they affect the quality of customer service. Before the installation, we would often get switchboard jams, while I literally had to stand up and look to see which operators were free.