When anyone designs, expands and sustains software applications for call centers and back office process management and coverage, you really have to be sure you come up with the right solution each time. We are experts in the field. Customers often say to us that we were the first contact center technology supplier they spoke to who had enough experience to be able to hit the ground running by understanding business needs instead of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.
The predictive dialer was developed by our independently-owned software company, supplying solutions to the telecommunications, financial and helpdesk industry. A remarkable innovation by IDS was the Operator Assistance Software (OAS), one of the world largest computer-supported telephony applications at the time. It was used by BT Operator Services to deliver a wide range of call handling and information services and, crucially, was part of the digital transformation of the PSTN in the UK. The technology under which OAS operated was the precursor to Computer Telephony Initiative (CTI) and provided the link between organization telephony, its information systems and its people. It was essentially the first generation of the robust platform that we have today.
Since the beginning the software has been constantly upgraded to keep up with the latest technology. Most of the dialers are now able to not only notice whether someone picked up the phone, but they also detect the difference between an answering machine and the actual person. However, to make this decision you need a very fast algorithm for the automatic dialing software to analyze. So far no auto dialer software can works with 100 percent accuracy, but many come close. VoIP is certainly making a much bigger impact in the industry today. Ken Reid of Rostrum Solutions commented anticipating the demand for the new decade, “2010 will see improved use of predictive dialers by call centers as they adapt to meet the changes this new decade is starting to demand, whether it is investment in home working or at the call center itself.” It is the responsibility of your SIP service provider, to provide training them how to use the system. Many companies even use video-based training to ensure that the appropriate procedures are followed. Ensure that training is included, and you will find value in your service and costs will remain at a low level. Ideally, your service supplier should not want you to invest in any type of hardware.
One cause of concern for many is that sometimes there is a long silent pause prior to kicking in when using automatic dialing, this depends on the type of answering machine detection (AMD) the service offers, in order to determine whether a person or an answering machine has answered the phone. Not all AMDs are created equal. Furthermore, in the case of some programs, when an answering machine/voicemail is detected, the software will wait a moment after the tone allowing for the maximum amount of information to be recorded on the answering machine. Efficient predictive dialing software delivers a great increase in operational efficiency which dramatically improves the numbers of successful calls completed, boosts revenues and has a direct impact on the bottom line. It seems that everybody wins with the predictive dialer- the call center remains operational at all times (and it can even save on office costs); the agent has the benefit of working from home – and the customer receives a continuous service.