Effectively handling large volumes of customer calls was a challenge faced by insurance company Tower Life. Among the issues it found itself facing was antiquated, legacy call center technology that prevented its customer service representatives from managing call queues and routing calls to appropriate agents, and it also sucked precious time away from Tower Life’s IT staff.

After taking a good look at its situation, Tower Life came to the conclusion that it not only needed a new PBX (News - Alert), but also that it was going to transform its call center into a fully-functioning contact center complete with unified communications, rich presence capabilities, more robust reporting mechanisms and multi-language IVR capabilities so callers would be able to utilize self-service technologies for lower-level requests.

With this direction in mind, Tower Life did its due diligence and made its final decision to go with Zeacom Communication Center (ZCC). With this system the CSRs at Tower Life are now empowered to manage call queues from the phone, e-mail, fax and web callback right from their desktops. The ZCC solution also fulfilled the criteria Tower Life had initially set forth with such things as a Spanish- and English-language IVR, and a number of routing capabilities including skills-based routing (the call is transferred to the agent whose skill-set best matches the needs of the caller), call back and call routing (instead of waiting in a long queue at peak periods, customers can be called back and CSRs can route callers to the last agent who handled the caller as long as that agent is available). These aforementioned capabilities are critical in helping the insurer effectively handle large volumes of calls and by extension, provide customers with the highest possible service.

“Our customers appreciate the ability to self-serve when they do not need to speak with a customer service representative,” said Ben Zachry, vice president of Tower Life. “Our new call back features prevent customers from having to wait on hold for long periods of time during peak hours. And now, we’re leveraging skills-based routing capabilities that direct callers to the CSR (News - Alert) that is best-equipped to handle their specific question.”

In addition to these improvements, CSRs are now armed with customer information though a screen pop as soon as they answer a call. Not only has this reduced queue time because CSRs don’t waste time asking customers for basic account information, but the expedience it provides makes for a more pleasant customer experience.

ZCC delivers the enhanced reporting Tower Life hoped for. As such, the insurance company is now able to examine statistical data and performance reports for the whole contact center while CSRs and management are empowered to view data in an unlimited number of scenarios.

The business benefits of updating and upgrading contact center software can be far reaching, as Tower Life discovered. By implementing a state-of-the-art contact center software system, Tower Life reports it has gained even more business benefits than described here.

It is now more effectively managing customer relationships because its customer service department is better able to quickly gain an understanding of its customers’ needs and can provide immediate support when called upon. And the contact center software has helped transform the company at large.

Zachry confirmed, “The new system has positively affected our entire organization – well beyond our customer service department.”

In other news, TMCnet reported that Natalie Romano, managing director of Strategic Consulting Services with Avaya (News - Alert), recently authored a whitepaper titled, “Five trends making news and driving change in contact centers.”  

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO West 2011, taking place Sept. 13-15, 2011, in Austin, Texas. ITEXPO (News - Alert) offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. To register, click here.