The National Emergency Number Association, or NENA, sets strict criteria in multiple areas of the emergency response process. Its standards are the gold standard of compliance in the industry, and following them will ensure that you’re ready to meet any emergency like a pro. After all, 911 dispatchers save lives every day, and the more efficient you are, the better you are at serving the public.
NENA’s standards include the following segments: Accessibility, Agency Systems, Core Services, Interconnection & Security, NG9-1-1 Transitioning Planning, and PSAP Operations.
Younger generations are less comfortable than any before with phone calls, and 64 percent prefer text messaging to phone calls as their primary method of contact.
Alice, 42, is one of the people who prefer SMS to audio conversations. She has laryngeal cancer that created chronic hoarseness, meaning that it’s difficult for people to understand her through a phone.
“I don’t know what I would do if there was an emergency and I needed to call 911,” she said. “Sometimes even my friends and family don’t know what I’m trying to say, much less a complete stranger during a scary situation.”
To keep up with the changing needs of the populations, your PSAP needs to make SMS familiarity a priority if it hasn’t already. This may involve learning common text abbreviations and creating a guide to communicating with brevity. To make the service more accessible with those with disabilities, you may also consider providing alternative ways of giving feedback, like visual or nonverbal responses.
This committee tests and defines the tools your PSAP uses to make sure they’re up-to-date and able to respond to emergency calls. Many of our clients have contacted us after wondering if their dusty old equipment was in compliance of NENA standards, and instead of wondering, the easiest way to comply is to entrust KOVA with your public safety software solutions.
KOVA’s Verint Media Recorder for Public Safety suite offers the latest technology and gives you all the tools you need to comply with federal, state, board, or agency mandates for call handing evaluation and reporting.
While protocol may seem overly stuffy or even frivolous in the realms of etiquette or dating, in your contact center, it is absolutely essential.
Your PSAP’s resident data entry team should be intimately familiar with all format protocol, because entering the information any other way may undermine the entire 9-1-1 system architecture. A typo can endanger lives or threaten the credibility of your records.
Your dispatchers should also understand geographical zoning—in other words, which calls are routed to which place.
This set of standards deal with the actual medium of the call, its connection, and the quality of the audio. Dropped 911 calls have caused concern in states as disparate as Tennessee and Pennsylvania in recent years.
"We expect 911 to be there throughout our entire call," Theresa Allocca, a victim's mother, said.
Your dispatchers need to understand how to handle call connection as well as the max volume of calls. If your PSAP is routinely getting congested, you’ll need to change the infrastructure to allow everyone to get through.
The aim of the NG911 movement is to transition from the traditional methods of operating a PSAP to a “next generation” model. This will continue to happen in the next few years, and your contact center is advised to prepare by moving as much of its data into NG911 infrastructure as possible. While a full-featured, completely standard-based NG911 system hasn’t been developed fully, it is in the works and PSAPs should be prepared.
When the unspeakable happens, 911 is the first to be contacted by Americans in crisis. The PSAP Committee provides drills for these anomalies, from natural disasters to power outages. Your contact center needs to practice these drills regularly so that the unexpected occurs, your dispatchers are prepared.
After all, public safety answering points need to be available around the clock, every single day. No matter the technical malfunction, epidemic, or flood, your dispatchers need to be ready to react. These extenuating occasions, your traditional response protocol won’t work. You need to have contingency plans readied, implemented, communicated, activated, and evaluated.
For example, in the occasion of geographic information system failure, supervisors should tell operators to use physical maps; if half of the dispatchers are out on sick leave, the Operations Officer should know to activate the “re-routing of calls to buddy” procedure.
Public safety access points (PSAPs) like yours are the first line of defense for Americans during some of the worst times of their lives. You’re expected to be there, 24/7, no matter how difficult the call or how hard the day. There’s no understating the importance of what you do: neglecting a call can mean the ruin—or even end—of someone’s life.
Unfortunately, an Albuquerque contact center is learning that the hard way and is facing endless scrutiny after one of its dispatchers handled a call in a very poor way.
On July 28, 17 year-old Jaden Chavez-Silver was at an Albuquerque party and became the victim of a drive-by shooting. One of his distraught friends called 911 and in a moment of frustration, used profanity. The dispatcher, Matthew Sanchez, said, “Okay, you know what, ma'am? You can deal with yourself, I'm not going to deal with this, okay?" right before the line disconnected.
Although Mr. Sanchez did dispatch an ambulance while still on the call, the shooting victim was pronounced dead at the hospital. Critics are saying the teen’s death might have been avoided if the dispatcher had stayed on the line and coached the caller in lifesaving measures.
“I don’t understand why he did what he did,” Nicole Silver, the victim’s mother, said.
The dispatcher, Matthew Sanchez, had been a 911 dispatcher for 3 years and 5 months. He quickly tendered his resignation. The Albuquerque Fire Department is now under investigation to see if Sanchez handled any other calls improperly during his tenure there.
Chris Carver, an operations director for NENA, said that hiring the right people can sometimes be more important than training. "They need to be professional at all times, detail-oriented, be able to handle stressful situations ... It isn't something everyone can do," Carver said. "It's a very specific set of skills that can be hard to find."
In the wake of this tragedy, remind your dispatchers exactly what’s at stake during each and every call—no one can afford to lose his cool or respond in any way except calmly and professionally. Review KOVA’s helpful tips on how to deal with a difficult caller, and consider calling a special meeting to remind your staff.
You might also find it useful to utilize our Verint Media Recorder for Public Safety software to record, search, and evaluate your dispatchers on a regular basis to avoid the trouble the Albuquerque Fire Department is now under.
In other top news, there’s talk within the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) of ending a nearly 20 year-old rule that says that wireless phones must be able to dial emergency services even after the owner stops paying for service.
The FCC says its proposal is due to popularity of low-cost plans, as well as problems the rule has created for PSAPs. In some parts of the country, 90 percent of 911 calls received from phones without service were fraudulent, and three out of four of those were made by kids playing with old phones. These false 911 calls slow down responses to legitimate calls and divert resources.
Wireless phones without service are also enjoyed by pranksters, because they’re harder to trace. These prank calls are a major distraction for dispatchers.
Still, some people are against the rule reversal. Critics say that some people rely on the wireless service without regular service for emergencies, such as lower-income, elderly, and disabled populations.
One way to deal with these fraudulent calls is to use KOVA’s Audiolog for Public Safety software, which can record calls full-time, on-demand, by event, or when scheduled. Having a record of these false calls makes it easier to identify and prosecute repeat offenders.
There’s a lot to learn for the savvy contact center supervisor who’s willing to learn from the news stories mentioned here
In the last few months, PSAPS in the news have made a splash for these top headlines. The savvy supervisor can learn from these news events and prepare themselves accordingly. Contact us at KOVA today for help upgrading your software to keep your public safety access point out of the news.
They’re the first people we call in an emergency-- our lifeline between disaster and the help we need. Emergency dispatchers are a crucial part of public safety for a myriad of reasons. They patiently talk our parents and grandparents through the tense and sometimes painful moments after a fall until help arrives. They tell police officers where to find us during threatening times like armed burglaries and abusive situations. Moreover, they’re always there when we need them.
Although they play such an important role in our lives, most of us don’t know very much about dispatchers besides the fact that they’re the voices on the other end of a 911 call. In reality, they’re so much more than call receivers. If you’re curious about what it really means to be a dispatcher, check out these 17 facts that will make you thankful for their service.
According to an article in Business Insider, emergency dispatchers routinely endure some of the most nerve-wrenching shifts in the country. On average, police, fire, and ambulance dispatchers score a 98.5 out of 100 for stress tolerance on the O*NET stress factor scoring system where higher numbers correlate with higher stress levels. In addition, the average dispatcher has a time pressure score of 68.3 and a consequence of error score of 86. For a profession that stands between life and death for many people, these scores are not surprising.
Because dispatchers are the lifeline between people in dangerous situations and the help they need, they often have to talk people through some tense and fear-stricken moments. Despite the panic ringing through the lines, dispatchers know they have to remain calm even in the most dire situations. Needless to say, constant exposure to the fear and crises of others is distressing to compassionate people, and dispatchers do their work in the midst of it all.
There are many types of emergencies, and dispatchers are trained to respond to all of them. From broken bones to burning buildings to hostage situations, every emergency dispatcher must know how to respond to each of them quickly and accurately, sending out the proper code to the appropriate first responders. This, of course, takes an impressive amount of mental clarity and focus.
Some 911 calls involve minor cuts and fender benders, but others are far more serious. Perhaps even dozens of times per day, dispatchers respond to calls of people minutes away from death or from family member fearing the worst for an unresponsive loved one. Although such calls can be emotionally jarring, dispatchers must remain calm and level headed in spite of the crisis on the other end of the line.
Emergencies don’t just operate from 9 to 5, and neither do dispatchers. If you know anyone who is a dispatcher, chances are that they’re getting home from their shift as you’re brewing your morning coffee. Just like police officers, firefighters, and ER nurses and doctors, dispatchers routinely stay up all night to answer emergency calls.
When an emergency situation arises, dispatchers have to know what to do based on the caller’s information at any given moment. Oftentimes, the caller with the emergency is frantic, disoriented, or unable to communicate clearly for a number of reasons, so the dispatcher must quickly construct a plan of action based on fragmented information he or she is being given on the other end. However, dispatchers are trained to accurately instruct the callers as to what they should do in the given situation as well as contact the proper response teams and give them the essential details. Quick-thinking is a must for potentially life-saving scenarios.
For all the hard work that they do to get us the help we need when we need it most, did you know that on average, dispatchers receive only around $36,000 annually? Many dispatchers work 12-hour shifts seven days per week - that’s 84 hours, and they may be during night shifts. Since dispatcher jobs typically require no college degree and are not considered specializations, the relatively low salary may not be surprising to most. Yet, a dispatcher serves one of the most important roles in the emergency response system.
Although technology has advanced through GPS service and other call center innovations, one of the most important parts of communication between a caller and a dispatcher is location. Although they can technically trace the call, giving your exact location information will speed up the process drastically, possibly making a lifesaving difference for you or whoever is in need of immediate aid. The faster they can know where you are, the faster help can come.
Another critical component of 911 calls is the dispatcher's instructions to the caller. Although they can’t be there physically when disaster strikes, they are trained in discerning what to do when that happens. As the caller, you will most likely be their “eyes and ears” on the other end of the line, and doing exactly as they tell you to do in an emergency could save a life. Trust them and do as they instruct until help arrives. In some cases, dispatchers have helped people navigate through severe medical emergencies and even dangerous situations involving hostage crises and armed robberies.
How are dispatchers able to take control of an emergency situation over the phone? The key is in remaining calm at all times. For one thing, most callers are in a panic when they dial 911. In addition, it is true that some calls can be rather jarring even for the dispatcher depending on the situation at hand. For this very reason, dispatchers are trained to remain exceptionally calm under all this pressure in order to help facilitate the best outcome for those suffering emergencies. Not only does remaining calm give them a clear head to give the proper instructions, make the right transfers, and relay the right information to get help on the way, but they also calm the callers down, which is equally important in tense situations.
On very rare occasions, there are times when not every dispatcher can make it to his or her station due to sickness, car trouble, or perhaps even an emergency of their own. When this happens, however, someone always pitches in to fill their space for as long as needed. Quite often, dispatchers will have to extend their already long shifts in order to cover for others when this happens. But there’s no room for grumbling and complaining in these situations, and everyone on a dispatch unit knows this very well. In short, they do whatever it takes to make sure that someone is always at the end of the line when you need them.
While working under intense pressure in such close proximity to one another may become aggravating at times, to say the least, at the end of the day, dispatchers as a whole are strongly united by the common bond of their life-saving profession and care for those in need. Teamwork is absolutely critical in a dispatcher’s work environment, and by working together to continue saving countless lives seven days a week, most dispatchers say they wouldn’t trade this camaraderie and collective sense of love and selflessness for anything in the world.
Who would work 12-plus hour shifts, every day of the week, birthdays and holidays, if they didn’t care about what they were really doing? Dispatchers are there because they care. They know that they’re a crucial asset to public safety, and they won’t stop at anything until help arrives at your location, wherever you are. In fact, many dispatchers end up turning what they thought would be a temporary job in the emergency call center into an entire career for the sheer reward of helping save live every day.
A dispatcher’s work is never done until the necessary personnel arrives on the scene. Dispatchers know that they are in most cases the only qualified voice around to give proper instructions in emergency situations, and they won’t even think about hanging up until they know that you or the person on whose behalf you’re calling is being taken care of by professionals.
It seems like common sense, but you may be surprised at some of the things that dispatchers are told are “emergencies” by callers. Did McDonald’s get your order wrong? Don’t call 911. Did a four wheeler speed across your front lawn at night, leaving two-inch-deep tire tracks all over the yard? Still not a 911 emergency. However, if you or someone around you is hurt enough to go to the ER, you sense some suspicious and dangerous activity around you, there is a break-in, or something is on fire that shouldn’t be, then call 911. Emergency dispatchers handle real emergencies, and the more non-emergency calls they receive, chances are that you could be taking valuable time away from those in true emergencies. On that note, do save your thank you or appreciation letters for the mail or the internet.
Even if they’re not physically witnessing a crisis as it unfolds, emergency dispatchers are in the midst of it nonetheless when they stay on the line. Quite often, they listen to horrors unfold on the other end multiple times a day, whereas many people have never experienced anything close to the real life situations dispatchers handle on a daily basis. To add to the stress of being present within each situation, the dispatcher on the line never knows the outcome of the situation, unless perhaps it appears on the news. Sadly, few people truly recognize the emotional toll answering crisis after crisis has on people serving in this line of work, and many of them end up with PTSD, diagnosed and undiagnosed.
Last but not least, in the ever-changing world of call center technology, dispatchers must always be on top of their game each time a new system is implemented. New developments in caller ID, interoperability networks, advance tracking systems, and other technological innovations designed to improve and speed up communication on all fronts are becoming increasingly more common. Thus, dispatchers must learn - and learn quickly - how to integrate these new programs into their daily work routines and help others along in the process.
Despite their long hours, endless pressures, and nerves of steel when it comes to handling emergencies, dispatchers are still compassionate and have some of the biggest hearts. The next time you see a dispatcher, be kind to them and thank them for everything they do to keep you and your community safe.
The other day, I ran into a friend on the bicycle trail near my neighborhood. We both espoused how happy we were to be enjoying the summer weather, exercising, and saving a little bit of gas money by riding our bikes. “Why doesn’t everyone do this?” I said, intending it to be a rhetorical question.
Laughing a little bit, my friend told me about his adult daughter, Michelle, who at age 22, still couldn’t ride a bike. My friend and his wife had tried to teach her as a child, but as soon as they let go, she would startle and fall. She didn’t learn, my friend said, until a few months ago, when her boyfriend bought her a bicycle for Valentine’s Day with the intent of teaching her. What he didn’t account for, after purchasing the bike, however, was that he had no way of fitting it in his car—so he rode it to her college dorm across town to surprise his girlfriend.
Picture that, a 6’ 3” college boy in all black, riding a tiny pink cruiser with streamers on the handle bars down a busy intersection in a college town. My friend was still laughing when she told me about the sweet gesture.
Still, despite the goofy visual and the thoughtful intention, I couldn’t stop thinking about how dangerous it was. In 2010 in the US, almost 800 bicyclists were killed and there were an estimated 515,000 emergency department visits due to bicycle-related injuries. Summer is a particularly dangerous time for this fantastic hobby, and we at KOVA put safety first.
Here are some safety tips for cycling to keep in mind for your family.
According to a 1989 study in the New England Journal of Medicine, riders with helmets had an 85% reduction in their risk of head injury and an 88% reduction in their risk of brain injury. Do you wear a seatbelt in the car, wear sunscreen at the beach, or have a working battery in your home smoke detector? Wearing a helmet should be a similar no brainer—that is, if you want to keep your brain in tip-top condition! This is the best way to keep your kids safe outside when they’re on their bikes.
I have lost my friend in bike accident 2 and half years back. Please use helmet and safety jackets #HelmetAwarenessByAJITHFans
— HBD ❤ ROGER FEDERER (@JonasThala) June 24, 2015
Stand over your bicycle. There should be 1 to 2 inches between you and the top bar if you’re using a road bicycle and 3 to 4 inches if you’re riding a mountain bike. The seat should be level front to back, not tilted at all. The seat height should be adjusted to allow a slight bend at the knee when the leg is fully extended. The handlebar height should be at the same level with the seat.
Teach your family to wear reflective, bright, or even neon colors when biking on or near a road. While it is cooler outside in the evening, riding at night is more dangerous when cars can’t see you. Another way to fight this problem is to place reflective stickers or tape on your bike or to install headlights.
Most bike-related accidents happen because of the rider’s behavior. That means that most bike-related accidents are totally preventable as long as you remember that you can’t be too careful about public safety. Bikes are vehicles, so they must follow the rules of the road. Model proper bike safety and be a good role model by stopping at stop signs, looking before turning, checking for school buses, riding on the correct side of traffic, and yielding to cars.
It should go without saying, but never text and ride. Similarly, it’s a good idea to avoid wearing headphones as you ride your bike so you can properly hear any honking or calls to look out. Never, ever ride drunk—not only is it incredibly dangerous, but it’s illegal in most places as well!
We at KOVA deeply care about our communities and want you to have the best and safest summer possible. For any questions about our services, please contact us.
Looking for more ways to stay active? Biking can be a fun, safe way to get around this summer. http://t.co/PqlsRk71KE
— Every Body Walk (@everybodywalk) June 27, 2015
What are your favorite bike safety tips? Let us know below in the comments!
Contact centers are known for occasionally being tough environments to work in, but as a manager, you have the power to change that and make your agents love coming to work. Any workplace can benefit from a strong, positive company culture, especially those that are based on human relationships, like contact centers. Here are five tips that can transform any business from difficult to delightful.
It’s said that every professional should perfect an elevator pitch: that is, a 30-90 second speech that sums up their accomplishments and skills to give during networking events. The elevator speech is to the professional what the mission statement is to a company. Create a short, snappy summary of what your call center does and make sure every employee knows it by heart. Every major change your organization goes through should support this mission. Create a code of ethics to complement it, and voila! You have the core foundation of your company’s culture. Display them both around the office—when your customer service representatives know the clear goal of the contact center, they will start taking responsibility for its success or failure.
As a contact center supervisor or manager, one of your biggest jobs is to quell any gossip, rumors, or negativity, which are poison to a productive environment. The easiest way to do so is to make sure employees are kept in-the-know about important changes and decisions; this clear communication will eliminate the need for speculation. Still, there will be times that you’re privy to more information than you need to give your representatives. Even in this case, it’s important to avoid dishonesty, evasive answers, or lies through omission.
The clear communication need not only flow one way, however. Provide your employees with an easy way to give your their feedback as well, and establish that no one will be punished as long as their comment is constructive.
Many companies are instituting a weekly event called Friday 15 for their team members to flex their creative muscles. For 15 minutes every Friday, the group attempts to complete a challenge, whether it is a silly Iron Chef-esque competition or a contest to design a better script for handling difficult client calls. These weekly get-togethers are used as opportunities to bond, build trust, outsource lingering difficulties outside their originating departments, and to continue educating great customer service professionals and great managers alike.
The best ideas don’t always come from management, and this routine time shows that your company welcomes new ideas and accepts errors as learning opportunities.
As we’ve said before, a good contact center manager invests in his or her team as people, and that means celebrating them for their accomplishments. Encourage your team to encourage each other, and you will end up with a better work environment—which will flow downwards all the way to the callers.
Meetings are one of the most frequently grumbled about aspects of the workplace—and luckily, are one of the easiest to tweak. In the United States alone, businesses hold 11 million formal business meetings a day and waste over $30 billion (with a B!) on unnecessary meetings per year. Parkinson’s Law says that work will always expand to fill the time it’s given, and meetings are no exception. Keep a timer handy, and keep your meeting on track.
When you improve your contact center culture, you improve your contact center. Contact us today to learn more about KOVA’s Verint Media Recorder Workforce Optimization suite, which can free up a busy manager to spend more time training, inspiring, and leading his contact center to success.
Here at KOVA, we’re always trying to make contact centers better for the customers, the workers, and the shareholders. We believe that management has one of the greatest influences on all metrics of success, and there are a few key ways to improve the contact center environment. One of those ways is for each supervisor to examine his or her leadership style. We’ve found that although the terms are often used interchangeably, there are some key differences between a contact center manager and a contact center leader.
According to the Oxford Dictionary, a manager is “a person responsible for controlling and administrating an organization or group of staff.”
A leader, on the other hand, is “a person who leads or commands a group, organization or country.”
The world needs both leaders and managers, but most people aren’t good at being both at once. Read on to see whether your style as a contact center supervisor is closer to a manager, a leader, or somewhere in between.
A manager spends most of her time coordinating employees, delegating tasks, scheduling shifts, and planning meetings. Managers are the busy bees of the contact center: they’re always on time and constantly moving from task to task. At their best, managers are the gears of a well-oiled machine, keeping things running smoothly. At their worst, they are frazzled and overwhelmed.
A leader spends most of his time at the contact center inspiring and motivating his customer service agents. He is efficient with his time and maximizes the amount of time with his agents.
A contact center manager is the gatekeeper of protocol. He is likely to identify strongly with the chain of command and finds order in the status quo. A manager is likely to receive some grumbles about his rigidity to a schedule, but people really do need structure and consistency—and a good manager provides that.
A leader perfectly straddles the line between flexible and flighty. She’s comfortable with bold new plans of action and consistently innovates and strives for constant improvement.
A good manager plans the plays that will lead her team to success. When things go well in a contact center, managers take the credit—and when things go wrong, it’s on them, too. Managers see what is universal at a company and capitalize on it, rallying customer service representatives to a common good.
A good leader sets an example of hard work and productivity through his actions. He is one of the most useful members of his team, not the most visible. A good center is the heart of any team, the anchor of the offensive line, and the main protector of the quarterback, but no one talks about him unless he messes up. Leaders aren’t in it for the glory—they see themselves as supporters. They do this by getting to know their team, learning what makes each person special, and capitalizing on their strengths.
In the new, information-based economy, people expect their contact center managers to do more and be more than ever before. Employees expect not only to be assigned a task but also to be given a sense of purpose. In a contact center, this can be difficult because many supervisors find themselves preoccupied with the details that come with running a contact center, such as scheduling meetings, ensuring compliance with government regulations, and staffing—managing the business, in other words.
However, these tasks can be done quickly and efficiently with KOVA’s Workforce Optimization software. After automating some of these responsibilities, the busy supervisor can concentrate on developing more qualities of a leader, which cannot be automated, replicated, or replaced.
Contact us today to learn more about KOVA’s unique Verint Media Recorder Workforce Optimization suite, which can take care of all the busywork that keeps you from rising to your full potential as a leader in the contact center environment.
One man’s jargon is another man’s key to unlocking success in his vocation, and though “FCR” may seem impossible to differentiate to some from the many other arcane acronyms that populate industry shop talk, to many contact center managers and supervisors, its importance can’t be understated.
FCR, or first call resolution, is, as its full name implies, the resolution of a customer’s issue in the span of their first and only call. To raise the percentage of FCRs is to make customers happy, while diminishing costs. What could be better? Though its appeal is obvious, it’s a little more difficult to understand why it poses such a challenge.
The factors that impinge on a robust FCR include disengaged agents, information gaps, and poor communication between different departments. It’s a fine balance to give agents the support and incentives they need to be effective listeners while staying in touch with a center’s quota and budget; however, more and more studies point to the imperative role customer service plays in a company’s longevity and growth. Tip one? Train your agents to be masters of customer service.
This, of course, does not mean that agents must tolerate rude customers or act out of integrity with the company’s values to appease an angry caller. It does mean that agents should be encouraged to be sincere, flexible, and genuinely interested in helping. It’s also vital that agents have access to a bigger picture.
Tip two: Give your agents the tools they need. Having knowledge of a company’s inner workings is a win-win situation; it provides customers with highly qualified assistance, and it also makes the agents feel invested in the company’s future. Can your agents see a customer’s history and account details? Are they aware of the precedents set by other callers or of the major issues the call center tends to troubleshoot? These are good points to cover in team meetings, in trainings, and while mentoring an agent one-on-one.
Tip three: Nurture inter-departmental harmony. It’s helpful if different departments can be taught to share notes or at the least become conscious of who does what and how to connect customers to the relevant contact person without too much guesswork. There is nothing more frustrating than being passed around from one customer representative to the other until the call finally drops or disconnects.
If you’re paying attention, these factors are adding up to the importance of personnel being “on the same page.” This can, at times, be interpreted quite literally.
Tip four: Keep good records. It may be worth investigating whether there is consistency in how customer interactions are logged. If the records are sloppy or even too detailed, it may be difficult to even get a sense of what your center’s current FCR is as it won’t be immediately apparent that multiple calls were related to a singular issue. Also, if a customer uses live chat online on Monday and then calls in over her cell phone on Tuesday before finding a solution, will the agent on the phone know that this is her second call, or falsely report it as an FCR? These are some of the essential questions to begin your investigation with.
Tip five: Think systematically: Different industries will have different margins of error and different ideal FCR rates. It may be a smart idea to find out your industry’s standard and then strive to be in its highest percentile. Then, get a little local. Look at the data (you may have to collect it first) and find out which are the customer issues that get dragged out the most. Is there a pattern that you can develop a more streamlined strategy to address?
Still feel like you need a little more help? Check out KOVA’s brilliant Audiolog for Contact Centers. It may prove an invaluable support in both record keeping and analytics in service of customer satisfaction.
The average American exchanges a whopping 914 texts a month. That comes to around 30 texts a day, and the figure is doubled for those between the ages of 18-24. While some of these texts are definitely lovers exchanging xoxos and friends trading stories and jokes, many are working out scheduling conflicts or troubleshooting arrangements like, “I’m cooking dinner; will you do dishes?” Though they are exchanges that take place in relationships more intimate than that between you and your cell phone company, they also include a certain transactional tone. Another way of putting it is that texting is highly functional, even if sometimes we see it as a symptom of an ironically disconnected society.
If there is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come, is there a way for contact centers and other businesses to ride the wave of texting to meet their customers where they are and leverage already existing cultural innovations?
In a recent study carried out by Harris Poll and sponsored by OneReach, it was found that 64% of customers preferred texting to calling for support. The “Harris Report” also discovered that there were specific needs which customers felt best about addressing through text. These included checking their order status (is it here, yet?), scheduling and changing appointments (gotta get that hair done!), making or confirming reservations (table for two, please), and asking a question, like, “what time do you close on Sundays?”
Customers also felt at home texting for directions, checking balances or deadlines, refilling orders (think pharmacy prescriptions), and resetting passwords. Notice any common threads? Many of the above tasks are a little tedious, a little mechanical, and don’t require highly personalized care by any means. And though there is a delight in making small talk as you check things off your to-do list, in an increasingly busy and demanding world, some consumers make the decision that their time is better spent on their loved ones and creative pursuits.
But, the contact center need not feel rejected, for if the basic spectrum of requests can be automated to be handled through text, it saves the company money and pleases the customer. What could be more ideal?
If your call center does choose to incorporate more SMS channels, it’s prudent to choose a messaging provider that can seamlessly merge with your API, or Application Programming Interface. This sync will help connect a particular client’s records with their phone number, so that questions that are more personal like “How much do I owe?” can still be processed without an agent needing to pull a file.
Once you’ve got your system in place, get the word out to your customers through a variety of channels – social media, email, flyer – that you’re now open to texting. You can also allow them to switch to text if they’re being helped via phone and it’s taking a little long. The invitation can even be a part of your IVR.
In conclusion, the time is ripe to capitalize on the phenomenon of “texting” to help ease customer-business relations, save money, and automatize routine requests.
As anyone who has ever driven to meet a friend that lives on a farm knows, there are often special directions needed, vast distances to cover, and some stretches with no Starbucks, reception, or population. One gets a similar picture when imagining the challenges of responding effectively to 911 emergencies in rural areas. Rural (and many tribal) areas are often also a little behind on technological developments and the infrastructure that might accommodate changes in telecommunications trends.
Despite a history of being underfunded and under-resourced, it is critical that these areas be given the attention they need, not only to meet the goals of the next generation 911 movement, but to carry out a promise to help those in crisis indiscriminately, whether they live in the city or the country. Supporting them is also an important piece in the struggle to prepare in advance for natural disasters and large scale public threats, which do operate indiscriminately. Finally, as rural households tend to be a little more isolated, it may be that much more urgent to have rescue available when there is a flood or a crime spree as it may be more difficult, despite the strong communal bonds that exist, to find a crowd of good Samaritans at hand.
For the call takers at public safety answering points (PSAPs), there are a different set of logistics in handling rural areas. The first responders may have a greater distance to travel and the call-taker might have to stay on the phone longer and or provide more extensive advice. Because hospitals are farther apart as well, ambulances may have to alter how they prepare, what equipment they take, and how to divide their time between different calls. These unique challenges can set up a dangerous situation, one in which a contact center can be too easily overwhelmed if there are simultaneous sources of trouble or a major public health hazard.
Specifically in the case of EMS, or emergency medical services, crews may have to wear multiple hats while managing with a small staff. Medical personnel may have to remain in contact with the crew of an air ambulance, a dispatch center, and the patient’s primary care providers. With longer wait times and a larger area to encompass, the crew will have to be more skilled in terms of life support services and pre-hospital care. With time being of the essence, there must be an effortless and interoperating exchange of information between the different hubs and teams. Local authorities can make such a network a reality through raising funds and investing together in systems that they then can share. This is as much a matter of acquiring the necessary technology as it is embracing collaboration and sharing a vision with related agencies.
Responding to these concerns, in September 2011, the White House announced changes in federal regulations specifically designed to make emergency care and communication more accessible to rural communities. The United States Department of Agriculture published eligibility requirements for a loan program that would cover the cost of creating well integrated public safety communication networks; the loan program would allow the USDA to draw on public and private resources to quicken the development of wireless networks, border security, and more sophisticated tracking tools for 911 call centers. Anticipated benefits include a better geographic information system (GIS) and the ability to contact 911 via text and to send in pertinent images and videos.
It’s easy to either overly romanticize rural America, or to ignore it; however, if we are to address its needs and include its vast landscape into the innovations that are at the forefront of urban life, we must be prepared to work, with sharp observation and smart planning, with a different set of variables.
In our country, we tend to have a double standard, or somewhat bipolar attitude, when it comes to veterans. On one hand, we acknowledge them as heroes and honor their courage, hard work, and sacrifice. On the other hand, we neglect to meet their needs – whether they be those of counseling and support groups to address mental health issues or that of financial security once they are no longer fighting our wars. It seems that we either valorize or ignore them.
In this strange discourse, their real needs of housing, employment, and community often get overlooked. As awareness of the harrowing challenges they face, on and off the field, during and after their time in duty, grows, there are also more programs to support them in their journey, as they have us – in our collective defenses.
Telecommunications giant AT&T, recently, in the midst of an intense growth spurt, announced a new promise to hire veterans for contact center jobs. A press statement from the company invited veterans to apply for the 75 new openings in a South Florida contact center. The invitation is part of a commitment to hire 5,000 veterans and their families by 2018. AT&T also clarified that the “charitable act” was more than charity. It affirmed the incredible value veterans deliver as employees due to their discipline, leadership skills, teamwork, and tech experience.
Comcast Corp. has hired over 4,200 veterans in the last three years and announced a similar initiative to hire 10,000 veterans, reservists, and their spouses over the course of the next three years. Many of these new hires work at Comcast’s contact centers.
Again, this is more than an expression of patriotism or sympathy; the big corporations insist that it is a sound business decision, and there is a legitimate overlap of skills between military service and customer service.
The same skills that helped military personnel adapt to foreign cultures and languages can assist them in the contact center while meeting different caller perspectives and complaints. The “group mind” that their survival depended on while at war can translate to an understanding of the importance of communication and collaboration in the contact center. Finally, the undeniable grit and toughness of our soldiers can shine as resilience and patience in the face of contact center stressors.
Contact centers usually seek new hires from the same pools of working age students or young single people looking for work, and though these demographics may have some qualities that make them great agents, they also tend to be a little more transient. For companies that are hoping to lower turn over, hiring veterans may be a game changer.
Statistically speaking, veterans have high unemployment rates. This could be a reflection of the turbulence of re-adjusting to civilian life, but it is also often a consequence of their battle scars, injuries, and disabilities. Luckily, contact center work does not require much mobility or physical exertion and with cloud-based contact center technologies, a veteran can be made an employee and accommodated with great flexibility.
As this powerful connection between veterans and contact centers catches on, some companies have even organized official veteran-hire programs, with veteran leaders. Here at KOVA, we make a point of honoring our nation’s heroes whenever and wherever we can. So our challenge to you is this: When will your contact center hire a veteran?