Call Center Management Featured Article
Understanding the Legal Reasons for Call Recording in Call Center Management
If you run a call center, chances are, you record calls for a number of reasons. For starters, you find training goes easier with real calls. Next, agent evaluations are fairer and more useful with recorded calls, which allow you to sample a number of an employees' calls over days or weeks, eliminating the chance that an employee will be unfairly graded on a bad day. You may also record to eliminate the chances of “he said, she said” scenarios with customers. Finally, you may have to record for legal reasons.
Call recording, however, is a challenge for many organizations. Call center call recording is regulated by a number of organizations to encourage best practices and reduce instances of data breach, wrote workforce optimization company Monet Software recently in a blog post. Different call centers may fall under the auspices of different agencies and regulations. To improve compliance with call recording software, there are some guidelines to understand, writes Monet. Following is a breakdown of some of the most prevalent guidelines for call recording in the call center.
PCI (News - Alert)Version 2.0 of PCI DSS went into effect on January 1, 2011. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) addresses telephone credit card transactions. The PCI DSS requires file encryption, secure storage and the deletion of certain information, such as the credit card security code. Data considered non-sensitive, and thus safe to archive, includes call date/time, customer ID, agent ID, sale or collection amount and hold time. HIPAAThe Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) includes regulations and restrictions on patient records to protect privacy. While conversations between patients and healthcare providers can be recorded, they must also be protected. There is also a training requirement to HIPAA that is made easier by the use of call recording software. Saved calls can be used to train staff on the accepted practices at a call facility. The Sarbanes-Oxley ActThe purpose of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act is to compel businesses to maintain complete electronic records of all business processes and transactions. Call recording software captures and stores all phone calls to insure compliance with this accounting reform bill, and expedites the discovery and auditing process should an issue arise.FIPSFederal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) apply to US government agencies and supporting contractors. Requirements here are very specific, and demand a high level of security and encryption to protect sensitive information in computer and telecommunication systems. If there is a government component to your call center call recording system, make certain it performs at the required security level.
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Edited by Amanda Ciccatelli