Quality of Call center of Telecommunication SPs

Transcription

1 Quality of Call center of Telecommunication SPs Dr. Anna Inverso AGCOM Consumer Protection Directorate AECID/ BEREC - REGULATEL Meetings Cartagena de Indias, April 13-15, 2015

2 Quality of call centers Increased use of phone services for customer assistance shows undeniable benefits in terms of saving time and money for both end-users and SPs, yet from a consumer s perspective attention must be paid to ensure that call center (CC) services are effectively responsive to needs of final users and ready to adjust accordingly their approach. This suggests that there may be scope and room for having a regulatory framework for quality 2

3 Quality of call centers The Italian experience In Italy, the NRA over the last decade received a growing number of complaints from users and consumer associations on poor quality of CC. Major constraints to users' access to CC services were reported to be: Difficulty contacting the service and long waiting times Lack of certainty of taking charge of complaints and information requests Inadequacy of responses and handling of complaints Lack of attention to people with disabilities (deaf) Failure to send the paperwork after the signing of a contract phone. Poor information often non understandable, incorrect or not complete Excessive intrusiveness of outbound services Little or no indication of the tools of consumer protection Therefore, in 2009, with Resolution n.79/09/csp, the NRA established the general rules and principles of behaviour to which call-center managers and employees must abide. 3

4 Quality of call centers Resolution n 79/09/CSP Principles of behaviour and rules (e.g., clear and competent answers, courtesy and use a proper Italian; consistency of answers on a same theme by different agents) to which CC s employees must comply when providing inbound services as well as making outbound calls (telemarketing) Use of free numbers for Customer service assistance A set of key QoS indicators, target values and a three-year plan of gradual improvement Ease of navigation within the Interactive Voice Response System (IVR) Ease of speaking with an agent, already after the first layer of the IVR anyway not later than an estimated time of one minute and forty-five seconds (for 1 year) Possibility for consumers to submit a complaint verbally through the call center Provision to the client of an identification code of the complaint, as well as provision of an identification code of the respondent Alternative means of contact (i.e. SMS, chat, fax, ) that SPs must implement in order to grant service s accessibility to users with disabilities (deaf and visually impaired) 4

5 Call centers KPI Accessibility to the CC services Time to cross IVR until the choice to speak with a human operator Waiting time spent until the answer of the operator Quality of services provided to end users Quality of call centers Percentage of one call solution The yearly target values of the 1 st KPI are defined by AGCOM every 3 years (glide path). Service providers should reach the target. 5

6 Quality of call centers Target Values for Accessibility to the CC services Time to cross IVR until the choice to speak with a human operator 1 year 2nd year 3d year Fixed line Mobile services Waiting time spent until the answer of the operator (time in seconds) 1 year 2nd year 3d year Fixed line Mobile services Waiting time spent until the answer of the operator (% of calls answered in less than 20 seconds) 1 year 2nd year 3d year Fixed line 30% 35% 45% Mobile services 45% 50% 55% 6

7 Quality of call centers KPI Quality of services provided to end users No target value set but great emphasis on facilitating users rights to complain Free complaint procedure Traceability of the complaint (complaint identification number) Quality of complaint management 7

8 Pubblication of results SPs are required to: Use the KPI for Quality assurance of their CC services Carry out surveys and semi-annual reports on these indicators Publish such reports on theirs website Send such reports every six months to NRA with detailed information on procedures for measuring indicators AGCOM publishes on its web site links to the web pages of quality results achieved by SPs 8

9 Monitoring implementation NRA verify compliance through consumers complaints, requests for information, on site inspections, websites checks NRA may bring actions against non compliant SPs and impose administrative fines Complaints Analisys Founded? Yes No Inspection at operator offices Summons on the operator Desk inquiry Request for documentation to operators Surveillance closed Transmitted to Sanctions Office Proposal for Sanction Yes Violation? No 9

10 Evolution of the Regulation on Quality of CC services It is ongoing a process of reform of QoS of Call centers based on: Review of the KPI for Quality of contact Promotion of customers assistance delivery through "digital" means ( , sms, social network apps, smartphone/tablet apps, chat and web site customer) Need to regulate alternative communication channel to customers and to define their quality requirements 10

11 Thanks for your attention