Customer Service is Suffering Due to Lack of Systems
Jadyn DePhi, Birdseye DBM
Snapshot
A call center struggles with the workload from their clients due to outdated systems. We work on providing a solution that will solve their incoming task problems, while keeping the solution cost effective. The implemented software solved a bonus problem for the company, and now their clients are happier than ever with their service.
Client Introduction
This call center company provides small customer service tasks for their clients, charging by the amount of time tasks take to complete. The tasks come into the agents via email from the clients, the time then tracked to complete, and from there the time entered onto a spreadsheet to confirm/track the charge for monthly invoicing.
Problem
What had worked for the company with minimal clients and agents, was falling apart at the seams with the growth they’ve experienced- capacity had been hit for a year now and stress was high. The email system, which was having all agents in the same support email to address tasks, was causing problems. Only a certain amount of logins could be supported at a time, causing agents to be kicked out of the inbox. Refresh rates were not fast enough to show if someone else was already working on an email, causing collision, time charging errors and missed items. It was also causing tension among agents, promoting a toxic competitiveness to get to the work and hoard emails to work on, resulting in errors.
Not to mention, the sheer amount of data being collected on a single spreadsheet was causing massive delays in loading the content, agents writing over each other, and time to invoice taking way longer than it should- pulling essential resources from the team on an already busier than normal day.
After looking at these issues together, I found another point we could look to improve with the found solution; their clients had no idea what their bill would be for the previous month until the first when the bill was issued. It caused a lot of stress and discomfort for their clients, having a looming bill that they were not able to check on, and perhaps lessened the amount they sent to the agency if the bill was not something they could afford.
Solution
After I demoed and reviewed over 50 softwares, only one checked all the boxes. Cost effective, time tracked, allowed DNS backend email connection, had internal automation and rule sorting, had individual logins for Agents, had dashboard reporting for management; and our special bonus box- had login capability for clients to see their running total bill for the month. The software we went with was HappyFox.
The full implementation time for this software was 2 months. We started by making an announcement to the team that the change is coming, and the expected timeline. After building out the companies systems in the software, internal training material was made and a small training course to be given to groups of agents. This brings us 1 month into the timeline, where agents now have access to the software to play and poke around in. The software was loaded with a bunch of test tickets, to allow this exploration and familiarization by the agents. Week 6 marked the switch day for agents, where the tickets were live in the system and they no longer needed to access the shared inbox to work. The next two weeks were dedicated to monitoring the system and ensuring questions and concerns by the team members were addressed.
After some time had passed, the final bill for clients not in the automated tracking was issued. With this invoice email, their login credentials were supplied along with the portal link, and a video explaining what they can expect.
Results
The agents and clients were thrilled! Collision between agents on a ticket decreased immediately to zero upon implementation, the flow of a daily workday for agents was instantly better, and management was excited for new insights that will allow them to give agents more support in areas lacking. The company could now easily scale to thousands more clients with the capacity this new system gave, and easily.
The call centers' clients felt seen, were very impressed with the initiative, and praised the new transparent time tracking platform. Complaints on monthly bills nearly disappeared.
My client had said, “I knew there was a better way to do it, I just didn’t know it would be this good.”
Conclusion
We often get comfortable doing things a certain way because that’s how we had always done them. What really sets companies apart are the ones that are willing to grow and improve especially when they feel comfortable, they are the ones that will have higher success in the future.