Streamline Your Call Centre

UK Claims Organisation Witnesses Rapid Growth With Daviker Solution

2011-11-14T14:21:00.004Z

UK Claims Organisation provides a one stop shop for people involved in road traffic accidents that wish to make compensation claims. The Liverpool based company was formed in 2010 and has already witnessed significant growth and has quickly established itself as a force within this highly competitive industry.

UK Claims Organisation buy data containing people who have previously indicated they were involved in a road traffic accident and wish to make a claim. In the initial stages of their operation, they manually dialled these individuals but this method of contact was proving highly inefficient.

Lesley Severs, Sales Manager added: “It seemed everything within the business was time consuming. We were not contacting nearly as many people as we would have liked. We simply couldn’t get through all the data and we were losing a lot of potential business. We had to ask ourselves the question, how long could we be viable as a business utilising outdated, inefficient methods?”

Daviker Proposals ‘In Tune’ with Claims Management Sector
UK Claims Organisation quickly made the decision to invest in predictive dialler technology and invited Daviker to showcase the TouchStar system. Lesley and Operations Manager, Joe Walker were immediately impressed with Daviker’s proposal.

Joe added: “It was a very easy decision to make. The Daviker solution had everything a growing business such as ours required. Furthermore, they seemed to be completely in tune with the specific needs of our industry, whereas none of the other suppliers seemed to have any understanding whatsoever. It was an easy decision to make!”

Very Fast System Implementation
Once UK Claims Organisation chose Daviker as their call centre supplier, implementation was quicker than expected. Joe added: “The engineers from Daviker quietly came and went about the job and before we knew it, the call centre was up and running in no time at all! They stayed on site to ensure everything was working properly and ironed out any teething troubles.”

Almost Quadrupling Productivity
UK Claims Organisation is witnessing huge increases in efficiency and productivity as the Daviker solution revolutionises their business.

Joe said: “The productivity increases have been phenomenal and the figures speak for themselves. We have gone up from handling 40 claims per month to 155, which has really allowed us to grow the business. We have recently doubled the number of agents on TouchStar and obtaining extra licenses could not have been easier.”

Simplicity
Joe and Lesley have been impressed by the simplicity and ease of use of the Daviker solution. Joe continued: “It’s easy to input data and the data recycling rules allow us to get a maximum ROI on the data we purchase.”

Lesley went on to add: “Small businesses like ours can’t afford to employ expensive IT departments so it is vital that the system is easy to operate and that’s the way we like it! Furthermore, the Daviker support team being close at hand is always willing to help with any issues.”

Agent Performance Improved Through Advanced Scripting
Daviker TouchStar has allowed agents to become ‘experts’ with all aspects of the claims process. Advanced scripting with logical branching includes pre-defined validation, calculations and decision making. This has been particularly relevant for the complexities of the claims process.

Joe added: “It works like magic. Everything we want the agents to say or calculate just pops up on their screens so the amount of time training them is kept to an absolute minimum.”

Improved Agent Performance - Call Recording and Monitoring
Joe has made intensive use of the integrated call recording and playback facility. He elaborated by saying: “I listen to agent calls every day to ensure our expectations are being satisfied. If we receive a complaint or have difficulties with a client, I can quickly retrieve the call and take any appropriate action necessary. The agents are also aware that calls are being recorded and this improves their performance. TouchStar Supervisor allows us to see in real-time the status of agents so I know how long agents are on call, in wrap time, unavailable and so on. ”

Seamless Business Integration with Workflow Solution
UK Claims Organisation also invested in the Daviker TotalWorkFlow solution which replicated the efficiencies gained from the call centre into the claims administration process. The two software packages have been seamlessly integrated and ensure maximum efficiencies have been obtained throughout the business.

Future
UK Claims Organisation is continuing to grow its business and see the Daviker TouchStar solution as an integral part of their plans. They are planning to move to larger premises within the next 12 months and expand both the claims and marketing companies.

Lesley Severs concluded
“We are here for the long term and expect to diversify into other claims management and financial service operations. Daviker solutions are so adaptable and versatile that we know we won’t need to invest further should the business model change at some point in the future.”

Potential Phone Scam

2011-08-19T11:32:00.009+01:00

We have been informed of a potential Phone Scam and would like to bring this to your attention:

"I received a call from a 'representative' of BT, informing me that he was dis-connecting me because of an unpaid bill.

He demanded payment immediately of £31.00 or it would be £118.00 to re-connect at a later date..

The guy wasn't even fazed when I told him I was with Virgin Media, allegedly VM have to pay BT a percentage for line rental!

I asked the guy's name to which he answered 'John Peacock' with the following phone number - 0800 0800 152.

Obviously the fellow realized I didn't believe his story, so offered to demonstrate that he was from BT. I asked how & he told me to hang up & try phoning someone - he would dis-connect my phone to prevent this. AND HE DID !!

My phone was dead - no engaged tone, nothing - until he phoned me again.

Very pleased with himself, he asked if that was enough proof that he was with BT. I asked how the payment was to be made and he said credit card, there and then.

I said that I didn't know how he'd done it, but I had absolutely no intention of paying him, I didn't believe his name or that he worked for BT.

He hung up.

I dialled 1471 - number withheld.

I phoned his fictitious 0800 number - not recognized., so I phoned the police to let them know. I wasn't the first!

It's only just started apparently, but it is escalating.

Their advice was to let as many people as possible know of this scam. The fact that the phone does go off would probably convince some people it's real, so please make as many friends & family aware of this.

How is it done?

This is good but not that clever. He gave the wrong number - it should have been 0800 800 152 which takes you through to BT Business.

The cutting off of the line is very simple, he stays on the line with the mute button on and you can't dial out - but he can hear you trying (This is because the person who initiates a call is the one to terminate it). When you stop trying he cuts off and immediately calls back.

You could almost be convinced!

The sad thing is that it is so simple that it will certainly fool the elderly and vulnerable.

By the way this is not about getting the cash as this would not get past merchant services - it is all about getting the credit card details which include the security number so that it can be used for far larger purchases."

For any further information about this scam, please contact Daviker directly on 0845 250 80 40.

Make your call centre 24/7, multi-channel and secure

2011-06-08T14:27:00.000+01:00

The news is full of stories telling us about technological changes in the way we communicate and transact. It is clear that we are in the midst of some very big and exciting changes. So how does this affect the call centre environment and what do you need to think about to remain competitive?

Firstly, the days when call centres could happily open 9-5 or even 8-8 are now gone. We now live in a 24 hour society and your customers, debtors and prospects expect to have be able to communicate with you any time of day or night. Daviker provides the technology to deal with this, even if you are not employing people 24/7.

Secondly, the 'call' is now only one of a variety of ways for your call centre to communicate with its audience. SMS can now be fully integrated into a Daviker TouchStar predictive dialler system and is a highly targeted way of reinforcing your message, providing reminders or calls to action.

Finally, a word on security as this is a technological challenge for many businesses. Does your call centre system provide you and your clients with complete security against credit and debit card fraud? The Daviker Payment Engine fully integrates with a Daviker TouchStar Predictive Dialler and ensures agents never have access to credit or debit card details and assists with PCI compliance.

Are you throwing money down the drain?

2011-04-07T10:41:00.009+01:00

Now more than ever, businesses are looking at ways to maximise productivity and efficiency, whilst keeping an eye on cost reduction measures when deemed necessary.

If you are a call centre that is still making outbound calls through a manual process (i.e. agents physically dialling, listening to engaged tones, no answers, etc.) you are literally throwing money down the drain. Can your business truly afford to do this?

Let me explain further - call centres that are manually making outbound calls will find that agents are only speaking to contacts around 25% of their time. Therefore, you are paying your agents full time wages for less than part time work!

Additionally, you could be spending too much time looking over your agents backs to check they are doing what they are supposed to be doing!

Data is incredibly expensive and finding you don’t have time to call it all is literally depriving your business of increased profits.

Increased Agent Talk Time = Increased Profits

Daviker exclusively supplies the TouchStar Predictive Dialler which removes the dialling part of the process, removes the engaged tones, removes answer machines and dead numbers and most importantly, removes the option for agents to pick and choose which contacts they are going to call.

It does however, ADD productivity and efficiency by up to 300% with agent ‘talk time’ increasing to around 45 minutes in every hour – and the biggest addition of them all is to your bottom line with massively increased profits.

Does Your Predictive Dialler Strategy Work?

2011-03-28T15:10:00.005+01:00

Our latest article in the April issue of Credit Collections & Risk Magazine.

Predictive diallers have been utilised by debt collection operations for a long time but are you making the most of them?

MORE than being just a tool to increase contact with debtors, predictive diallers have become a barometer to measure the success or failure of the entire operation. It is perhaps time to take stock and evaluate whether your system is truly optimised to its fullest potential.

Experienced collections managers already know it is not just about installing the technology and instantly getting results but more about implementing successful business strategies built around the predictive dialler that wins the day. Are you doing enough?

Why Have Predictive Diallers Been Such A Resounding Success?

There are many reasons why forward thinking debt collection operations made investments in predictive diallers – contacting more debtors being the most obvious. In addition, the following have been especially important:

1) Using a manual dialling process it is near impossible to call all debtors across multiple numbers through a pre-determined strategy of calling times and recall rules. Predictive diallers have become a essential tool to ensure all debtors are consistently called on a regular basis and data penetration is maximised.

2) Management information such as ‘number of attempted contacts’, ‘call outcomes’, ‘date agreed to pay’, etc are commonplace reports and integrated real-time call monitoring and call recording ensure legal requirements are met. If you are collecting debt on behalf of clients, you can bet their demands have increased of late and this information is proving essential.

So, if these are some of the key priorities for your collections centre, are your key dialler strategies optimised to ensure you obtain maximum ROI from your predictive dialler investment?

Dialler Speed

Incorrectly, many collections businesses put too much emphasis on dialler speed – the common misconception is that dialling more numbers at a quicker pace will automatically result in increased contacts.

However, the only increase that is often gained is the number of dropped calls which can not only impact their ability to collect from debtors, but can also result in the dialler slowing down the pace it dials to ensure you comply with Ofcom regulations.

The mathematics is fairly straightforward too. Collections data will be ‘burned’ four times faster if the dialler connect rate is reduced by half due to increasing the dialler speed – so the collections call centre is effectively making four times the effort to obtain the same number of payment arrangements.

Agent Burnout

A predictive dialler that is paced too fast can cause agent burnout and this can have unforeseen consequences. Collections agents don’t want to take a call every five seconds and, whether you are aware of this or not, agents are known to ‘dump’ calls.

This practice is wasting yours or your client’s data – ask yourself, would your client be happy to discover that someone who has been recorded on the dialler as ‘Not Available’, was in fact available but your agent was not interested.

Duplicates

Duplicate records can have a significant impact on the collections call centre. If you have three duplicate records of a debtor and have their home, mobile and work number that are called once a day, you would in fact be calling them a minimum of nine times a day.

This significantly increases the likelihood of being perceived as harassing the debtor – who may be more inclined not to pay. Not only is this bad practice it is an annoyance to the debtor, flaunting regulations and wasting a significant amount of time.

Quality Assurance

It is one thing for calls to be connected to agents in the most efficient manner possible but another to ensure that agents are actually making collections! You need to consider quality assurance systems that monitor performance and identify any training requirements.

A quality predictive dialler will come complete with real-time statistics, historical reporting, call recording and coaching and monitoring that will enable you to do this.

We couldn’t stress more that it is imperative to use these tools to ensure you don’t have a scenario in which the dialler is well optimised, yet you still achieve mediocre bottom-line results because the agent performance is not being monitored.

Conclusion

There are many ways in which collections centres can optimise their predictive dialler solutions. This article is merely an introduction to some of the issues to consider. There is much information and many tools available from the right predictive dialling equipment – it is up to the collections operation to get more from their equipment.

Consider starting with a thorough analysis of your business KPI’s . Then establish whether your predictive dialler solution can be tailored to help you achieve those KPI’s easily - satisfying the ever increasing demands from your clients.

Are hosted diallers as attractive as they seem?

2011-03-02T15:45:00.000Z

It’s fair to say, we have received a number of requests for hosted dialler solutions over the past few years. Many are attracted by the common misconception of lower setup costs of these systems. However, there are a number of reasons why the premise based TouchStar Predictive Dialler remains the best choice for any outbound call centre with more than six agents making large amounts of outbound calls – saving money being top of the list!

How do you think the hosted companies make their money? Many of our customers that have previously used hosted diallers have told us that the costs of calls are significantly higher month on month and crippling their business. In addition, any hosted dialler is on a pure rental basis, meaning you will never own the system and after a period of time you will have paid considerably more (often twice as much) than you would have with a TouchStar Predictive Dialler. Daviker also offers market leading finance packages to make the purchase of TouchStar even more attractive.

Do hosted diallers integrate seamlessly with your CRMs and back office systems? Do hosted diallers provide your business with multi-channel contact options such as SMS and payment processing? The answer to both these questions is extremely unlikely, difficult and costly - if possible at all.

Click here to see all TEN reasons why the TouchStar Predictive Dialler is a much better value proposition than a hosted solution.

Credit Collections and Risk Article

2011-02-09T09:08:00.009Z

The following article is featured in the latest edition of Credit Collections and Risk (CCR) magazine. This is a must read for professionals working in the debt collections industry. It is especially relevant for those involved with the collection of debt for utility bills.

Increasing Utilities Collections with a Multi-Channel Contact Strategy

Any collection is difficult, but utilities collection is the toughest and can be unyielding without smart utilisation of additional communication technologies.

FROM discussions with customers, we have found that the biggest issue facing the collection of debt for utility bills is talking to the people that are, for whatever reason, difficult to contact.

Taking payment from people who either can’t, won’t or are genuinely unable to pay has proved challenging for many collectors. This can be a sensitive area with gas, electricity and water being essential, life sustaining commodities rather than luxuries that can be cut back or done without altogether.

Furthermore, when a utility company is forced to withdraw a facility, it can face bad press, difficult processes and high costs which can make it ‘less worthwhile’ than taking back a car or domestic appliance. The debtor often knows this and may feel less uncomfortable when not paying.

How Can Technology Help?

We live in a 24 hour society with communication options available any time of day or night. So is the modern consumer being unrealistic by expecting to pay bills and debts 24x7x365?

Collections operations cannot afford to staff call centres overnight so what is the alternative? There are 8,760 hours in a year and even the most ambitious collections centre is usually only open about 40% of this time. Fortunately, contact and payment technologies have advanced to a degree that now allows collections to take place at any time.

And collections operations that offer a multi-channel contact approach including payment automation, predictive dialling, text-to-speech, automated IVR, and SMS are far more likely to collect from such hard-to-reach debtors.

Maximising the Investment in Existing Contact Centre

Advanced interactive voice response (IVR) means that payments can be processed at any time without any human interaction. Debtors can also avoid the potential embarrassment of speaking to a collections agent about their outstanding debt – often a deterrent for debtors calling to make utility payments. Our experience has shown that by removing this obstacle, collection payments will increase as a result.

Data security is paramount and advanced contact systems now provide total payment security ensuring collections agents never have access to customer credit or debit card details, assisting with PCI compliance.

SMS Alternative

There will always be a percentage of clients that can be contacted by traditional methods such as post or telephone. Both avenues have been used extensively by debt collectors, either by direct mail or predictive dialling, often as a combined campaign. The addition of SMS messaging to the collector’s armoury provides another method of reaching difficult to contact debtors. Over 95% of texts are opened and messages can be highly targeted.

SMS can easily be configured in a way that only debtors who haven’t responded to a designated number of calls will be contacted by this method. They can be used for payment reminders or acknowledgment of payments. Inbound calls can often be prompted as a direct result of an SMS increasing dialogue with the debtor.

CRM and Back Office Integration

Data duplication is costly and time consuming for any collections operation using predictive diallers. Therefore, it is imperative to choose a system that will fully integrate with existing CRMs or back office systems.

Consider this, if a debtor was to send in payment by post, or call a team not based on the dialler, would you want them to be called later in the day, or even the next day, reminding them for payment? Of course not, and fully integrated predictive dialler systems ensure that any update made anywhere within the business automatically updates the dialler in real-time.

Seamless integration ensures time and money is not wasted and again, can improve levels of customer service and satisfaction.

Conclusion

We have all accepted for a long time that verbal communication is the strongest form of persuasion and the role of outbound dialling has never been in question. Extending its functionality to include text-to-speech, SMS and secure payment automation can only improve collection rates.

By removing excuses not to pay, reminding by SMS or voice messaging and providing a ‘thank you’ for payment may not only achieve the next payment, but improve the debtor’s perception of your operation.

TouchStar: The Benefits

2011-02-03T11:45:00.003Z

Contacting people by phone is still the most effective way of grabbing immediate contact with your customers, prospects or debtors. TouchStar is proven to multiply contacts and will provide your business with all the functionality required to make your business highly profitable.

For a brief introduction on how a TouchStar Predictive Dialler will revolutionise your business, please click here to view our Flash presentation.

TouchStar Fully Complies with New Ofcom Regulations

2011-02-02T10:36:00.004Z

As you may have seen or heard in the news, the new Ofcom regulations concerning abandoned calls and answer machine detection came into force today. Call centres now must ensure:

Abandoned/dropped call rates must now include a reasoned estimate of false positives (where a live person is detected as an answer machine).

When contacting a consumer using a predictive dialler and an answer machine is detected, you cannot call back for a period of 24 hours unless a call centre agent is on hand to answer the call.

The financial penalty available to Ofcom to assist in combating silent calls has now increased from £50,000 to £2 million.

At Daviker, we have already ensured that all our customers are fully compliant with the new regulations. The TouchStar Predictive Dialler has always provided businesses with total reassurance that any outbound calling activity works within the Ofcom, FSA and DMA guidelines.

TouchStar complies with the above regulatory changes by calculating the abandoned rate based on the formula supplied by Ofcom and the DMA. In addition, TouchStar's recall rules ensure all customers remain fully compliant with the new regulations.

A Multi Channel Approach

2010-05-28T15:00:00.023+01:00

While predictive diallers have stood the text of time, there are now additional methods to improve customer contact.

Initially, many collections operations invested in predictive dialling technology to improve contact and liquidation rates. The organisations that made the investment reaped benefits in terms of cost reduction and increased voice contact efficiency (up to 300%). This has been recognised at credit industry awards, where many of the winners have embraced predictive dialling technology at the forefront of their collections campaigns.

However, they did not stop there... Nowadays we are seeing an integrated, multi-channel approach involving SMS, email, text-to-speech and payment automation.

There are still some operations that are dialling manually and not benefiting from the advances in technology. Are these companies about to wither and die?

Technology Continuum

Collections organisations have seen a radical overhaul of their technologies in recent times involving five main stages in a technology continuum.

1) Ten years ago, most were contacting debtors by dialling manually from paper records with huge staff and premise overheads.

2) As CRM solutions became more established, organisations started to dial their clients directly from data provided by these systems.

3) Basic automated predictive dialling started to become popular, tripling agent productivity and debtor contact rates.

4) Over time, some of these systems became more sophisticated and included detailed reporting, call recording and CRM integration.

5) Nowadays, the most advanced systems include a fully integrated and multi- channel platform including SMS, email, text-to-speech, voice broadcasting and automated payment facilities.

If viewing the collections industry as a whole, there is a huge variance in which organisations sit in this continuum – it is evident that the most successful and progressive agencies are currently employing the more advanced technologies. At which stage does your organisation sit?

Treating Customers Fairly

The collections industry has been subject to increasing levels of regulation and customer service has become key to achieving higher collection rates. The FSA sponsored Treating Customers Fairly (TCF) principles have become the benchmark for best practice. In addition to this, clients have become far more media savvy and demanding.

Prior to the technological advances, debtors could only make payments in standard office hours which proved impossible for some. In today’s ‘always on’ environment, this is no longer acceptable and is certainly not treating customers fairly. Fully integrated call centre systems now allow a business to operate for the full 168 hours in a week compared to the 40 hours a week customers were used to. In this respect, customer service levels have improved four fold.

Secure Payment Processing

Data security is a very hot topic - now more than ever. A call centre worker was recently jailed for stealing £250,000 from customers - using the credit card details stored on internal systems. The most advanced predictive dialling systems now have complete payment security in which agents never have access to customer credit card data and helps organisations become PCI compliant.

The best-of-breed predictive dialling systems now allow collections agencies to respond and have secure payment processing capability available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Integrated text-to-speech allows collections operations to communicate payment reminders through automated voice broadcasting and allow debtors to pay with their credit or debit card.

SMS Integration

Some debtors can be notoriously difficult to contact. A high quality predictive dialling system will allow collections agencies to contact debtors on various numbers at different times of the day. However, even this capability is sometimes not enough.

According to an article by Mark Cohen for the New York Times, 97% of SMS are opened and 83% of SMS are opened within the hour. Therefore, it is quite clear that this is a highly effective and targeted tool for contacting debtors. The most advanced predictive dialling systems allow for this additional layer of contact to be fully integrated with the dialler. Bulk or highly targeted messaging based on user generated rules and criteria such as ‘tried calling five times’ can be created. SMS Engines also allow debtors to text back with keywords such as ‘CALL’. This is fed back into the call centre system and calls that debtor immediately – improving levels of client satisfaction and increasing the likelihood of successful collection of monies.

Agent and CRM Interaction

Clients will always feel reassured when speaking to a human voice so agents will continue to be one of the most valuable resources within the business. They can often be the difference between the best and the average agencies. However, the better predictive dialling systems raise the performance of the weaker agents closer to that of the best.

Voice broadcasting and out-of-hours payment options will increase collection rates but there is still a need for human interaction. Better systems allow for automated outbound calls to be directly transferred to a live agent and IVR and skills based routing ensures the agents with the appropriate skill set take the relevant calls.

It is now imperative for any predictive dialler to fully integrate with a CRM, back office or collection system. A system will provide the dialler with data but it also needs to feedback the result, updating the original record after a contact or transaction has been made. A seamless integration of the system and dialler ensures that time and money is not wasted through data re-entry and duplication.

The diagram below illustrates the effectiveness of a multi-channel approach with complete back office system integration within a call centre.

Cost Factors

In an era of belt tightening, credit limitations and increased uncertainty, it can be tempting for some collections operations to muddle along with the perception that ‘doing nothing’ will see them through the difficult times. It has now been proven by various ROI calculations that the opposite is the case.

Adding a TouchStar predictive dialler on its own has a fast return on investment, this has been recognised for a long time. Adding a predictive dialler that is integrated to a multi-channel approach extending collection hours to a full 168 hours per month has to be a great investment. As the more progressive agencies improve their efficiencies and become leaner organisations that are fit for purpose, can your organisation afford to be left behind?

Being shortlisted for a National Business Award

2009-05-13T09:54:00.000+01:00

As a company who has gone to extraordinary lengths to serve our customer's needs and really add value to their businesses, we thought it was time we told the wider world of our commitment to our customer base.

Therefore, we are delighted and honoured to have been shortlisted for the very prestigious National Business Awards in the Customer Focus category.

Our motto is to do all we can to help our call centre software customers grow, as when they grow, we grow!

Life at TouchStar Towers

2009-05-12T12:29:00.016+01:00

We have settled very nicely into our new offices at The Works Business Centre in Manchester.

Customers who have come for training have been highly impressed by the improved facilities available. Here are a random selection of photos of our staff taken at our new premises:

Left to right: Justin Smith, David Innes & Barry Carter from Technical Support. Nick Aghahowa and Greg Smith lurking in the background.

Left to right: Basha, Nick Aghahowa, Greg Smith, Sarah Currie, Liam Harris, Ben Booth, Richard Coward and Alec Glassford. Admittedly there are a few backs of head on this one!

Liam Harris and Greg Smith from the Sales & Marketing team.

Sales Director, Dave Fricker Jnr.

Left to right: Justin Smith, Dan Rothery, Barry Carter & David Innes from Technical Support

Managing Director, Dave Fricker Snr.

TouchStar call centre software customers receive 24x7x365 support and free of charge monthly training from these very offices.

Call Centre 101 Article - Integration of Predictive Dialling and Workflow Automation Technology

2009-03-26T12:26:00.003Z

The following article has been published in this week's edition of Call Centre 101 from www.callcentreclinic.com

Management Objective:

Replicate front end call centre efficiencies and cost reduction mechanisms to back office operations by integrating predictive dialling technology with workflow automation

Author: David Fricker, Managing Director, TouchStar Call Centre Software

For many years, predictive diallers have been recognised for their ability to reduce call centre costs and increase productivity, efficiency and accountability. Recent developments however, have seen the need for integrated business systems that includes a feature rich predictive dialler combined with a fully automated workflow management system – such as TouchStar Workflow.

What are the benefits of predictive diallers?

On average, call centres making outbound calls increase agent productivity by up to 300% with a predictive dialler. This is achieved by using complex dialling algorithms to calculate and initiate more calls than there are agents available; the system will filter out dead numbers, busy tones and answering machines - connecting only ‘live’ contacts through to the agents. A competent dialler has a range of flavours available including power, preview, predictive and unmanned dialling available to the company across multiple campaigns. In addition to reducing potential agent costs, a predictive dialler will also make better use of data by recycling. It is absolutely imperative that any predictive dialling solution is compliant with Ofcom regulations with regard to ‘dropped’ or ‘silent’ calls and FSA regulations with regard to TCF (Treating Customers Fairly).

Sophisticated dialling systems now allow for inbound and blended campaigns with IVR and skills based routing, provide searchable call recording facilities, bespoke real time and historical reporting, text to speech and the ability to monitor agents from remote locations and adapt ‘whisper coaching’ in which allows call centre managers to train staff without the contact being able to hear.

The integration of workflow management – and the creation of greater efficiencies and cost reduction in both the front and back office operations

The integration of a predictive dialler combined with automated workflow management allows call centres to cut costs, provide greater synergies and if correctly implemented will ensure that every area of the business is working at maximum efficiency. The beauty of integrating the call making process and task management, two roles that are often carried out by different departments, is that both the front and back office process costs are kept to an absolute minimum and the technology provides the means to increase both agent and administration performance. In prosperous times this is very desirable, in the current economic climate, it becomes essential to survive.

So how could an integrated workflow management combined with a predictive dialling system help a call centre through the difficult times? On its own, a predictive dialling system allows agents to speak to three times as many prospects or customers but it is often the case for many call centres that fulfilment is not fully optimised. Agents’ time is very productive but the back office function can be inefficient and the cost savings created by the dialler are reduced by not having the appropriate management information on the full business process – this is where workflow management comes to the fore. The front end agent script can be totally integrated into the workflow so that should a positive outcome emerge from a call, such as a sale or renewal, the information provided by the contact can be immediately built into the workflow and a task created, e.g. send product or contract. And all this is created seamlessly in one single system avoiding any time and resource consuming duplication.

Automation of back office tasks

Workflow management provides a number of benefits which affect the core tasks of any business. Firstly it minimises manual intervention, e.g. standard letters, forms, emails and texts are all produced automatically and at the right stage of the life cycle rather than by hand and adhoc. This naturally creates huge time and cost savings as administrative staff no longer have to re-enter client specific detail – exactly the same information that has been either entered by the agent at the front end of the operation or within the data set.

Secondly, there is increased throughput as any chase-up tasks are scheduled automatically. These could be set by a manager or by a front end agent with the system reminding staff should a particular task not be completed. Many companies ask the question, what would happen if the letter, invoice or winning tickets didn’t go out in the post that night? And what if there was a marketing drive at the front end of the operation yet the stock had not been ordered? By having an automated workflow management system, these worries are consigned to history. Managers can view exactly what each member of staff is working on in real time – by monitoring the operational aspects, campaigns can be prioritised by the front end call centre staff.

As a result of these elements, customer service levels are naturally improved as the workflow system assigns and schedules all tasks in line with a company’s specified service levels. It allows a company to apply the skills and expertise of the best qualified professionals across all skill levels within the business – which has become critical if organisations are to survive during lean times.

Adaptability

Outbound call centres often have the requirement to deliver multiple campaigns to different client groups at any given time. For example, a telemarketing operation may be the outsourced operation of a number of large bluechip companies and will be working on a number of parallel campaigns. Other companies that once sold mortgages or other financial service products may now have completely changed their business models and be operating within the personal injury sector. As companies like this must be responsive to market or client changes, the solution must be equally adaptable.

These are the types of organisation that have traditionally used predictive dialling technology but have up until recently missed out on the benefits provided by a fully integrated system with workflow management. Therefore, it is vital for a call centre to source a product that can be easily configurable to these changes as in many cases the system could be rendered unfit for the new purpose.

Tough times, hard decisions, available solutions

In the current climate, hard decisions may need to be made for companies to survive and these will usually involve reducing staff overheads. The combined predictive dialling and workflow management solution can provide multiple benefits for an outbound call centre. An operation dialling manually could be spending three times as much on staff than necessary. Many centres have recognised this yet have not seen that productivity can be given a further boost along with customer service levels and reputation.

There are many types of outbound call centre that benefit from an integrated dialling and workflow system. Examples in which such a system has been successfully employed include telemarketing, claims management, collections agencies and personal injury specialists. Call centres that are continuing to thrive in this age of economic difficulty are those are ensuring the same philosophy that creates value at the front end is subsequently replicated. A software vendor must also provide a highly consultative approach to allow call centres to reap the full benefits of this new integrated system.

On the move...

2009-03-18T10:24:00.000Z

Monday 23rd March 2009 heralds the start of a new era for TouchStar Call Centre Software as we are moving to new offices at The Works Business Centre in Manchester.

We feel the new training and development facilities provided by the new centre will provide us with the capability to expand our already highly commended customer support provision. This forms the backbone of the business and feel the move will enable us to reinforce the relationships we enjoy with our customers.

Finally, to celebrate the move, we are launching a 5-a-side football team to play on the pitch opposite the offices. So if you fancy giving the might of TouchStar FC a game let us know!

Credit, Collections and Risk Magazine Article

2009-03-04T15:08:00.000Z

The following article features in the March 2009 edition of Credit, Collections and Risk magazine.

Increase Productivity with Automated Diallers

The pressures faced by collections operations mean that modern dialling technology is a valuable tool to business

By David Fricker

For a number of years, collections operations have utilised automated dialling technology as a mechanism of increasing contact rates and reaching clients that are notoriously difficult to get through to. The increased pressures placed on the collections industry in recent times have accentuated the requirement for operations to reduce costs and increase efficiencies – all of this in addition to retaining and improving overall levels of service. To many, this has raised the question of whether predictive diallers are a tool to add value to existing business processes or an absolute necessity to remain in business. Has it now become a case of do or die? Or can they provide the opportunity to ‘make hay while the sun shines’ – increasing the ability to collect before debtors become unserviceable?

For the uninitiated, automated diallers (including predictive, power, preview, unmanned, etc.) use complex dialling algorithms to calculate and initiate more calls than there are collectors available. They filter out dead numbers, busy tones and answering machines and this means agents are kept busy with live contacts rather than dialling numbers and not reaching debtors. As a result, productivity is increased - typical examples are between 270 and 280 per cent within the collections industry, thus reducing the requirement for an increased number of collectors when compared to dialling manually.

Modern automated dialling systems such as our own TouchStar for Debt Collections solution provide much more to collections operations than a means to contact clients in a more cost effective manner – they have become integral to all business processes and the better systems now integrate with back office workflow processes and CRMs. This is vital for any collections operation as data consistency throughout all areas of the business is paramount to avoiding unnecessary and costly duplication.

There are certain processes within any collections operation that do not require a human presence. Messages can be automated with either a global message or one that is personalised. Text to speech technology means that an automated message from a collector can be conveyed - for example, an unpaid council tax bill detailing the outstanding amount and with the option for the debtor to pay on the same call. This has been proven to increase collection rates. There had been some concerns raised about this process in the last year but Ofcom’s revised statement clarified it remained an acceptable method of contact for the collections industry. Naturally there are cost saving implications, especially in terms of staffing with unmanned dialling.

In challenging times, the requirement for an array of accurate and real time management information as a tool for decision making becomes more critical than ever. The more advanced systems now provide many standard reports and the ability to develop bespoke reports as part of the package. Advances in visual display technology means that at any time managers and collectors can see on large wallboard screen exactly how well collections are doing on a particular day – this can increase collector competition and subsequently increase collections.

It is difficult to predict the outcome of this turbulent period but collectors armed with automated diallers look far better positioned to maximise collections in an otherwise unpredictable climate. A dialler arms them with the tools to ensure that every debtor is contacted on a regular and timely basis and usually before IVA or bankruptcy applications take place.

By David Fricker
Managing Director
TouchStar Call Centre Software

www.ccrmagazine.com

TouchStar Consultancy is Launched

2009-02-25T12:09:00.000Z

Today we have announced the launch of TouchStar Consultancy, a service designed to help UK call centres optimise their use of call centre technology and improve business processes.

Every call centre is unique and there’s never a text book answer to issues within a centre and a bespoke solution is more often than not required. Our approach is to help call centres deliver their business objectives by conducting a thorough analysis of their valuable resources – their people and their technology and how they fit with their business processes. It is only at this point we can advise on how to get call centres to what we describe as the ‘efficiency zone’.

Areas in which we can help call centres include:

Management strategies
Utilisation and implementation of technology
Operational procedures
Call centre design
Cost reduction
Change management
Technical, supervisor and agent staffing
Recruitment and Training
Performance optimisation

We have simultaneously launched the white paper – Creating a Call Centre ‘Efficiency Zone’ – designed for call centres to simultaneously increase levels of morale and motivation in tandem with utilising technological processes. If you are a call centre in the UK and download this white paper you will be entered into our competition to win a free day’s consultancy.

How Can UK Call Centres Tap Into The Potential of SIP?

2009-02-06T11:35:00.000Z

The emergence of SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) over the past few years has been one of the most exciting developments in telephony. Call centres have been slowly migrating from traditional ISDN platforms but the effect has been more of a trickle than a flood. So why should call centres consider upgrading to an IP based solution?

Well the first and foremost reason is SIP enabled call centres have the opportunity to contact clients by far more than traditional voice communications. The protocol means that multiple communications channels including email, chat, IM, text and video are now reality.

Secondly, SIP enables multi-site call centre operations to be controlled from one console – no further need for duplicated IT staff on additional sites, so further reducing costs. As the operation no longer has to be one building, growth is easier as traditionally recruiting a call centre of say 300 staff is more difficult than six sites of 50 agents.

As call centres are naturally looking at reducing expenditure due to the economic slowdown, cost efficiencies must be another big reason to adapt a SIP based solution. For those really tightening the purse strings, platform, energy and heating costs are reduced due to the flexibility of next generation multimedia cards that integrate with SIP.

However, at the moment ISDN is still the most resilient choice for voice and SIP is not available for calls in many areas. The beauty of a TouchStar system is a call centre can migrate to SIP trunks when they become available without having to rip out hardware and the process is one of evolution rather than costly revolution.

The full potential of SIP for call centres is constantly evolving – new applications are going to emerge over the next few years and the operations that tap into this massive potential are the ones that will inevitably prosper. Many call centres have barely scratched the surface in exploiting these technologies but by deploying a SIP solution it effectively future-proofs their operation for tomorrow.

Can Predictive Diallers Help Call Centres Through Recession?

2009-01-29T15:05:00.000Z

Welcome to the first TouchStar Call Centre Software blog post. And what a time for a first post with the depressing news we are constantly seeing in the media. It is inevitable the call centre industry will be affected and it could very well be a case of survival of the fittest. For centres making outbound calls, predictive diallers are likely to become a necessity rather than choice.

A lot has been written over the years in relation to predictive dialling technology. Issues regarding silent calls and increasing legislation have somewhat questioned the validity of diallers. However, the simple fact remains that predictive diallers massively increase the amount of contact with the individuals or companies in which a call centre wishes to speak. And this cannot go unnoticed by contact centres wishing to survive in difficult economic times.

TouchStar predictive diallers only connect live contacts through to call centre agents and this means that their productivity is increased from an industry average of 17 minutes in an hour on manual dialling to around 47 minutes using a predictive dialler. And as times are invariably getting tougher for all, many call centres must look at reducing costs. Call centres making outbound contact simply cannot afford to continue dialling manually and literally wasting on average half an hour per hour of agents' time.

However, a quality outbound call centre system should provide much more than a predictive dialler. Customers need a mechanism to return calls so an inbound function with IVR and skills based routing is a must. The ability to make informed decisions is more vital than ever before so a robust reporting system is absolutely necessary. In many vertical sectors, the ability to record and quickly search and playback recordings is a business essential. Naturally supporting your agents and providing a script for them to follow and quickly amend goes without saying. And the ability to monitor agents' calls from anywhere in the world with an internet connection to allow clients immediate access to their campaigns should be fundamental to a call centre system. This is merely scratching the surface of what any TouchStar system can offer a business.

Contact us to find out more on how TouchStar Call Centre Software can help your business increase efficiency and reduce call centre costs.