Virtual Call Center

Serving as yet another example of how today’s virtual call center solutions are facilitating the home-based agent model, Direct Interactions, a call center outsourcer which uses disabled veterans for its home-based agent program, is reportedly seeing great success using Contactual’s SaaS (News - Alert)-based virtual call center software.

As a result of deploying Contactual’s virtual call center software in 2007, Direct Interactions has been able to tap into a unique “niche” labor pool for its home-based agent program.

“Since Contactual (News - Alert) is easily adapted for people with disabilities, it makes it easy for us to hire them,” said Jonas Nicholson, executive vice president, Direct Interactions, in a customer case study posted on Contactual’s website. “As a result, we can recruit from a large, hardworking and technically savvy labor pool.”

“When people lose a particular skill or ability, they compensate by getting better at other things,” Nicholson added. “We found that people with disabilities that have a tough time leaving their home excel in using technology. These people are motivated to work really hard and they make great employees.”

By tapping into this unique labor pool, Direct Interactions has been able to significantly reduce agent attrition.

”Agent turnover and absenteeism is significantly lower for us than the industry average -- reducing the costs of agent training, quality assurance, and management,” Nicholson said. “We’ve found the turnover rate for employees with disabilities is dramatically lower than it is for other employees. They take their time to do things right and once they are onboard with us, they stay for a long time -- much longer than most companies are able to keep a customer service rep or a call center agent.”

“Our focus on hiring people with disabilities has been a winning strategy for us and our clients,” he added. “When you’ve got the same agents managing your accounts for a long while, they become experts, and that means increased productivity. Contactual facilitates our ability to hire and manage this type of workforce.”

One key advantage of Contactual’s virtual call center solution, OnDemand Contact Center, is that it allows call center managers to monitor home-based agents and record their calls no matter where they are located. Also key is the online training and coaching that is facilitated through the system.

“Contactual has definitely delivered cost savings in our training programs,” Nicholson said. “We condense our training time by recording calls with Contactual and using the recordings to train new agents. Managers can sort call recordings by duration to quickly identify long calls that could have been resolved faster, or save the best calls for trainees.”

What’s more, Contactual’s FAQ Knowledgebase has also been helpful for getting Direct Interaction’s home-based agents quickly versed on clients’ products and services – plus it helps agents address customer queries consistently, knowledgeably and quickly.

Another key advantage which Contactual’s virtual call center solution delivers to Direct Interactions – which is particularly important to call center outsourcers – is its business continuity capabilities.

“Disaster recovery and business continuity are part of our business,” Nicholson said. “Some of our clients pay us essentially for call center insurance. So, if their on premises call center has an outage due to weather or if a lot of their agents are out sick, Direct Interactions will have agents standing by using Contactual.”

Nicholson pointed out that Direct Interactions’ call center operations are less affected by the weather than traditional, single-site contact centers because its home-based agents are geographically dispersed.

Also important is the fact that Direct Interactions -- through its use of Contactual’s virtual call center solution -- is keeping its call center jobs here in the US, as opposed to shipping them overseas.

To download a free copy of this informative customer case study and learn more about the advantages of Contactual’s virtual call center solution, click here.