Ian Dewsnap asks how responsive is your telephone system?
Telephone systems seem to have featured far too often in my work this year. There’s been nothing too major, and I am certainly no IT expert, but my clients have either reported problems with their phone systems, or the systems have featured in some way during our investigations when undertaking service process projects.
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A couple of weeks back, one client advised me that its new phone system was installed in June, but today only 11 out of 27 staff still have correctly functioning phone extensions. Testing had been inadequate prior to launch. This was obviously having an impact on customer service and is rather obvious in daily work. But what about those problems which are more subtle, or go unnoticed and which become ‘just the way things are’? They can impact customer service and productivity.
Not knowing how to transfer calls is a common issue. I am somewhat ashamed to say, at times, it has occurred in my own work experience. Guilty as charged. But now, looking from the outside, I can see rather better the impact on customer service when a caller is waiting to be transferred to another person and then left in silence until the original operator comes back on the line, with the surprised tone of one who realises that they still have the call. Or worse still, the operator loses the call, leaving the customer either waiting for nothing or cut off altogether.
Transferring a call seems so simple we don’t often invest in ensuring a short training and trail. We sort of assume that everyone
can do it, or they look it up in the book. Tell me it doesn’t happen at all in your business.
Now, shouting across the office to find someone to take the call is something else I have recently witnessed at a major
company. I sympathise with the clerical staff, since there was no operator switchboard and they can’t see all of the open
plan office easily, but getting up to find someone to take a call is certainly a disruption to process efficiency. Having the
customer hear "Is anyone in customer services able to do a settlement?" is not the image the directors had in mind for
their customers.
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By GlobalDataAlso, more than once, voice recognition software is employed with modest results. Surely you can join me in having a disaster story to tell about attempting to communicate with software like this. When it works, it’s great; when it doesn’t, it’s very frustrating. I know,
because not only have I had the experience we’ve all shared, but I have called clients’ systems, recording the call so I can track
the timing and prove the routing of my call. Several tests were performed by more than one of us (why such a problem with a
Yorkshire accent?) and the client was surprised by our findings. There were no standards for the levels of calls which the
system was expected to handle automatically, no objectives for dropout rates and no regular testing of the system to know
what was actually happening. Sometimes the large-volume phone system reports don’t tell the whole story.
What do you do about routing the calls at lunchtime when the operator isn’t present, or when you don’t have an operator?
One recent system I came across had automated responses in it to provide self-service options. But when neither option was chosen, calls fell back to the new business team. Now if there is one department I would choose not to have their workflow disrupted by calls not intended for them, it would be my new business function.
So go on, find out what really happens within your phone system. You might be surprised.
Ian Dewsnap is director of UK operations at BenchMark Consulting International
