BT has announced that Prudential, one of the UK's leading financial services providers, has invested in BT QueueBuster systems at two of its key contact centres.
As a result, Prudential is already benefiting from improved customer satisfaction and enhanced call handler morale. Prudential's decision to purchase the systems followed the recent announcement of a multi-million pound, five-year outsourcing deal with BT.
The project also represents the first time that BT QueueBuster, a pioneering queue management system based on technology from BT partner NetCall Telecom, has been used within the financial sector. The first device has been installed at Prudential's operation in Craigforth, Scotland, which primarily serves financial advisors. The second is in use at Prudential's Belfast contact centre, which manages enquiries from the company's policyholders.
Designed for contact centres of 100 agents or more, BT QueueBuster reduces call abandon rates and improves customer satisfaction by giving customers the option to receive a return call, rather than wait on the line. The system holds the caller's place in the queue then, once he or she reaches the top, generates an outbound call and connects the customer to an operator.
Dorothy Hall, Prudential's contact centre development manager, said: "I have been very impressed by the enthusiasm of our call agents for the QueueBuster solution. In all my years in the call centre industry, I have never come across a product that has generated so much positive morale among call handlers. We were looking for a reduction in abandoned, repeated and lost calls, enhanced management of peak call demand and improved levels of satisfaction both for the customer and the call agent. BT QueueBuster provides all these benefits," she confirmed.
Shaun Hewitt, Prudential's project implementation manager said: "We originally took the Craigforth system on a three month trial. Within eight weeks, the benefits were so clear we decided to buy the system outright and extend the trial to Belfast. Shortly after that, we purchased the second solution. One of the main benefits for us is that the system ensures promises are not broken."
"If a customer asks for a call-back, that customer will, in almost all cases, receive it. Our call-back success rate using BT QueueBuster is currently running at 99.5 per cent. In addition, because the whole process of making and receiving calls is more efficient with QueueBuster, the average time taken per call has been radically reduced," adds Hewitt.
The BT QueueBuster system can also help to deliver significant direct cost savings to contact centre operations. Gary Bullard, managing director, UK, BT Global Services, added: "Call centres which use QueueBuster are always impressed with the cost-efficiencies it brings. Today, more organisations are realising that it is too expensive to staff peaks, only to have agents under-utilised in non-peak periods. BT QueueBuster solves these problems by increasing contact centres' peak call handling capacity without increasing staff costs."