Special global call center outsourcing summit highlights.

RT: Why are so many companies and agencies reluctant to begin using home-based or virtual agents. It seems like such an ideal situation and a cost-cutting idea, in addition; but TMC research tells us that few teleservices providers are making use of home-based agents. What technologies need to come on board before companies will be tempted to take the "center" out of "call center"?

LM: There are several key success factors for using remote agents. First, the agents must be provided with the same capabilities as in-house agents. Second, remote agents must have a high quality, reliable and cost-effective voice and data connection. Finally, supervisors must be able to effectively monitor and manage remote agents.

The technology best suited to support these requirements is voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). While VoIP has been available for the past few years, it is only recently that high-speed access has been available to a significant portion of the residential population.

SER's solutions support both local and remote agents. Whether you have single agents working from home or a group of agents at a remote location, such as off. shore areas, our TSP 300 and soon-to-be-released TSP 500 switch support VoIP agent audio connections. This allows a remote agent to receive both voice and data over a single data connection with significantly lower bandwidth requirements. The widespread availability of DSL or cable broadband Internet access allows at home agents to have a cost-effective, reliable, secure connection using Virtual Private Networks (VPN). SER's call management systems do nor differentiate between remote and local agents, so the full capabilities of our systems are available to all agents. Calls can be transferred between local and remote agents, and remote agents can conference in supervisors when assistance is requited. All agents are included in both real-time and historical reports. so supervisors can properly manage the entire agent pool.

RT: Are the FTC's new rules regarding outbound calling and dialers realistic, and how will these rules affect your industry? Are the new compliance rules created by the Telemarketing Sales Rule too draconian to comply with?

LM: An enforcement action by the FTC can carry such a high penalty that failure to comply is not an option. Complying with the TSR will reduce the productivity of any customers who have historically operated at greater than a 3 percent call abandon rate. The need for these clients to lower their abandon rate will result in fewer connected calls per hour.

Our customers may also find themselves expending significant resources to respond to consumer complaints. The details of the Do Not Call registry will not be well understood by consumers. Consumers will expect an immediate cessation of calls once they request their name be added to the registry. However, since companies are only required to download the registry every 90 days, the consumer will likely continue to receive calls for a period of time. Additionally, consumers may not be aware of the businesses that are exempt from compliance such as charities and those with pre-existing relationships. These misunderstandings will result in complaints to the FTC, each of which will need to be responded to by our customers.

As noted by Meta Group, SER already has the best dialing algorithm in the industry, so our systems remain productive at the mandated 3 percent abandon rate. To help our customers with other areas of the legislation, we have introduced several new features and products. To assist our customers in demonstrating compliance, including management of reporting information for the requisite two-year timeframe, we have enhanced our call management products to support logging of additional compliance-related events through Compliance Reporting and Compliance Report Archiving. We have also introduced a suite of products that use automated speech recognition to deliver Automated Call Validation and Quality Monitoring. These productivity-enhancing solutions enable our contact centers to recoup compliance-related productivity losses through substantial cost savings in another areas of their business.

RT: How have more sophisticated recording and monitoring techniques improved the contact center experience for consumers?

LM: Today, quality monitoring, even with the use of sophisticated recording and monitoring techniques, requires the use of an expensive human resource. Therefore, quality monitoring is currently done on only a small percentage of calls, usually 5 percent or under.

SER's Automated Quality Monitoring solution uses breakthrough speech recognition software to enable contact center supervisors to quickly evaluate and improve agent-customer interactions, This solution can examine 100 percent of the calls, and flag problem calls to be reviewed by a supervisor. Now, rather than listening to an entire call or monitoring only a small fraction of all the calls made, SER's Quality Monitoring solution automatically performs extremely accurate, high-speed audio searches of customer interactions looking for calls that do not meet Key Performance Indicators (KPI) -- divergence from the script, use of inappropriate language by agent or customer, indications of dissatisfied customers, etc. This can lead to early problem detection and enable agents to be coached in a timely, appropriate manner. Better trained agents will result in improved contact center experiences for consumers.