Telephone capacity to 3VW’s ACD’s was becoming stretched, due to higher call volumes customers were frequently hearing engaged tones. To compound the issue the two ACD weren’t integrated, so balancing the human resource capacity at both sites had become a cumbersome manual process, especially difficult in periods of unpredicted demand. Both ACD’s had separate reporting tools so Resource and Planning decisions were difficult.
 
Reporting was only capable of provide information on the calls which were received, there was no awareness of the number of calls lost each day in the network and how many customers had to call back. The existing ACD reporting was not a true assessment of the actual or potential demand on either contact centre.
 
Callers to the Operation department were frustrated because they were forced to listen to a broadcast of all the information announcements even if they didn’t apply to their area. Three Valleys had no measure of how many call were actually abandoned before the appropriate area announcement was heard.

Intelecom’s Web-based virtual contact centre solution named Consorte PULSE was implemented to integrate both the ACD’s and credit card payment system.  Using a specifically designed Consorte web based management tool 3VW now has one view of their customer contact function. Along side, Consorte SONAR reporting tool has enabled access to statistical data, measuring both contact centres giving 3VW one complete system.

The integration needed no capital expenditure and has given a massive improvement in satisfaction for both Customers and 3VW internally. This integration was a key success factor delivering 3VW a number or OFWAT performance improvements. 

Intelecoms platform is delivered from within the UK telecoms network has a massive call handling capacity; every call is queued in the network so callers never receive an engaged tone. This was of great benefit to 3VW because they did not have to increase site line capacity to achieve measures set out in DG9 “Telephone Call Handling” report which contributes to 3VW OPA (overall performance assessment) set out by OFWAT.

The load balancing feature of PULSE automatically distributes calls according to capacity at a location in real time. Before Intelecom, 3VW had a full time member of staff allocating resource on a proportional basis as a reaction missing the real time need. 
 
Intelecom manages advanced routing functions for 3VW, which included postcode routing, mobile routing and automated credit card payments. This functionality filtered the calls so agent capacity is better utilised and callers can gather the appropriate information quickly without the need to queue, which has been a key contributor at reducing the 3VW abandoned call rate.

Since the implementation of Consorte PULSE 3VW has had a staggering 50% reduction in telephony costs, driven through better utilisation of resources and zero call forwarding costs. Because Intelecom holds the call within the network there is no ‘trombone effect’ when forwarding calls as with traditional PBX systems. The Head Office kiosk has also closed and 3VW is now better positioned to achieve the OFWAT service level objectives.