Are you a customer, supplier, vendor or business associate trying to reach out to a bank, insurance company, call center or any organization utilizing an auto attendant? How well is your call being connected to the sought after party or department? As TMC’s Tammy Wolf wrote, “Most likely, an automated service response or auto attendant has been put in place to lead you to your designated department, directing you to press different numbers and speak information, all the while weaving you in and out of menus and choices.”
Nowadays, the utilization of an auto attendant service is the path most companies are choosing, in order to cut costs. According to Forrester Research (News - Alert), it costs $6 for every call handled by an actual person, while a call handled by an auto attendant costs between 5 and 25 cents.
Unfortunately, auto attendant directories and services can go awry, and most often, it’s because such things as messaging, pronunciation, directory updates, among other auto attendant features and details go without proper attention, leaving the caller wishing for the days of an operator and a switchboard. As I have written before, it’s easy to point fingers when things go wrong, especially if you can point the blame on an auto attendant rather than a real person. But all this pointing of fingers won’t do a thing. No one wants to be in an endless loop of automated directions, such as the caller in the video below. Leave the frustration behind and get connected.
Parlance, a provider of speech-enabled call-routing solutions, takes the initiative to jump into action and help the customer solve the problem. Every Parlance employee, from company executives to service engineers, knows it’s a necessary responsibility to CONNECT THE CALLER. This company-wide philosophy, coupled with Parlance’s robust managed services, have made all the difference for their many customers and perhaps could be the answer for your call center and your customers.
Jaclyn Allard is a TMCnet Web Editor. She most recently worked on the production team at Juran Institute, a quality consulting firm producing its own training and marketing materials. Previously, she interned at Curbstone Press, a nonprofit publishing press in Willimantic, CT, and fulfilled the role of Editor-in-Chief for the literature and arts journal published by the University of Connecticut. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by Janice McDuffee