Patent ID: 7809118

Claim:
A method of converting messages and responses between text messages of a user at a first location and voice responses of at least one agent in an automatic contact distribution system at a second location having a plurality of agents and a plurality of format conversion plug-ins, comprising: assigning a respective plug-in of the plurality of plug-ins to respective selected agents of the plurality of agents and activating the respective plug-in in response to the respective selected agent logging on; receiving a text message in a text format at the automatic contact distribution system from the user at the first location via a network; assigning one of the selected agents to handle the text message and enabling the plug-in assigned to the assigned selected agent in response to a determination that the plug-in is required; converting in the enabled plug-in the text message from a text format to a voice message in a voice format; converting in the enabled plug-in a voice response in the voice format from an agent to a text response in the text format, the voice response being in response to the converted text message; and sending the text response from the second location to the first location via the network; wherein text is sent to and received from the user such that the user appears to the user to communicate with the agent solely on a text basis, and wherein simultaneously, the agent appears to the agent to communicate with the user solely on a voice basis in substantially real time.