Aspect Communications Announces General Availability of TeleCall 2000 Software.

Business Editors & High Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 4, 2000

Technology Offers Inbound/Outbound Call-Blending Capabilities

Designed to Enhance eSales, eMarketing and eSupport CRM strategies

Aspect Communications Corporation (Nasdaq:ASPT), the leading provider of customer relationship portals, today introduces Aspect(R) TeleCall 2000, a software dialer that helps contact centers increase productivity by automating their outbound customer contact methods. Weeding out busy signals, no-answers and answering machines, the software sends only live calls to agents, which can improve the results of dialing campaigns by increasing agent-to-customer talk time. To reduce hold times and improve service levels, TeleCall 2000 can automatically switch agents from outbound to inbound calls as inbound call volume rises. Compatible with the Aspect Customer Relationship Portal, the software offers three outbound dialing modes - preview, progressive or predictive - to help enhance a contact center's eSales, eMarketing and eSupport CRM strategies through the use of Aspect Call Center Software.

"TeleCall 2000 helped us turn a problem into an opportunity," said Andrew Palmer, general manager, Credit and Collections, Chadwick's of Boston. "When a batch of merchandise that failed to meet our quality standards inadvertently entered our supply chain, we were able to personally contact several hundred customers in one afternoon to proactively arrange the return of the items, which resulted in a positive response from our customers. In addition, with the help of TeleCall 2000, our collections agents were able to achieve a 42 percent increase in collected revenue while managing several customer service campaigns, including defective materials replacement."

"By automating the dialing process, contact centers can reach more people and achieve business objectives more quickly," said Beatriz Infante, Aspect co-president. "TeleCall's applications range from recalls and collections to product promotion, telemarketing, fund raising and proactive customer satisfaction campaigns. This software is designed to support a company's overall customer relationship management program."

Unlike the complex, hardware-based dialers, which lack open, standards-based software, TeleCall 2000 is an economical software-only solution that provides all of the benefits of outbound dialing and is easily adaptable for meeting current and future business objectives.

TeleCall 2000's call-blending capability can help contact centers retain staff and decrease hiring costs by reducing workload monotony. The balancing of duties also reduces the need to hire dedicated inbound or outbound agents; contact centers can optimize existing agent resources. When call volume is down, formerly inbound-only agents can fill the lull by making outbound calls. When call volume is up, formerly outbound-only agents can help maintain service levels by answering calls. To decrease the initial costs of cross-training, TeleCall 2000's browser-based telescripting functionality guides agents with appropriate, detailed responses to customers that can be altered quickly as business conditions change.

The Aspect Customer Relationship Portal

The Aspect Customer Relationship Portal allows companies to build eCRM applications that integrate front- and back-office systems, eCommerce applications and multimedia contact centers into one centrally managed eBusiness system. The Aspect Portal Multimedia application unifies and personalizes customer interactions across Web, phone, fax and e-mail to identify, qualify, cross-sell, up-sell and route customers in real time. The Aspect Customer Relationship Portal was recently named a Best of Show award winner at the Fall '99 Communications Solutions Expo (formerly CTI Expo) and received Product of the Year in the "Multimedia Customer Contact Portal" category from C@LL CENTER CRM Solutions magazine.

Aspect Communications

Aspect Communications Corporation is the leading provider of customer relationship portals, a software platform for building and deploying eCRM applications that enable businesses to ensure consistent interactions with their customers from one centrally managed eBusiness system. Aspect's leadership position in customer relationship management solutions is based on its 14-year history and more than 7,300 customer contact center implementations. Aspect is headquartered in San Jose, Calif., with offices in major cities worldwide. For more information about Aspect call 888/412-7728.

Aspect and the Aspect logo are trademarks and/or service marks of Aspect Communications Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other product or service names mentioned in this document may be trademarks of the companies with which they are associated.