2nd October 2007 | Contact the Editor | Register here to receive your own FREE copy of contact news

LATEST NEWS				PRESS RELEASES Clean Sweep for UCMS in National Awards Genesys Appoints Paul Segre President and CEO Aspect Software Names James Wong General Manager for ASEAN Region Avaya Announces Stockholder Approval of Acquisition of the Company Sipho Zungu is new CallingtheCape CEO Amcat launches new call centre software within Stellar Altitude IP Contact Center Honored For Delivering Exceptional VoIP/IP Communications Solutions  CALENDAR OF EVENTS Contact Centre Training Sessions - Workforce Management 1-2-3 Melb 3rd - 4th Oct Syd 8th - 9th Oct Bris 10th - 11th Oct Aspect Customer Experience (ACE) New Generation Customer Experience - Simplified 24 - 27 October 2007 Phuket, Thailand Boosting People Performance in Contact Centres 26 - 27 Nov 2007 Sydney Australia EXECUTIVE BRIEFING SERIES Click images below to download issues of the executive briefing series: NEW: Issue 5: Customer Relationship Management - Back in Vogue Issue 4:  Multi-Channel Management - Channel of Choice Issue 3:  Hosted Services - On-Demand In Demand Issue 2: Making the Move to IP - Voice of Change Issue 1: Performance Optimisation - Make a Connection  ASIA NEWS Register to receive FREE Asia News
Telstra to expand Adelaide contact centre
Australia's No. 1 telco Telstra has announced plans to create 200 new jobs at its Adelaide internet support centre. The Big Pond contact centre presently employs 185 staff. Justin Milne, from Telstra Big Pond, told reporters the Adelaide centre has won customer service awards, which is part of the reason for the latest expansion. "We are creating 200 new jobs here because we need to, so we've got to find a place to put them," Milne was quoted as saying. "We're putting them in South Australia because we do get great support from the Government here, South Australia is a great place to be expanding and building a new workforce.
Unity4 hiring 60 people to work from home across Australia
Unity4 is expanding with the acquisition of a major new client, and is now hiring home-based agents across Australia in order to meet the demand from new and existing customers. Unity4's home agent call centre allows the company to match each agent to the right client program. Recruiting from a large and diverse pool of applicants also ensures that employees are more mature and better qualified than agents in traditional bricks-and-mortar call centres. This results in improved sales conversion, greater revenue per call and increased customer satisfaction for customers like NRMA CareFlight and the Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife. "We are excited that so many companies are recognising that Unity4 and the home-based contact centre model can deliver the quality and value companies are looking for from a sales and customer care perspective" said Daniel Turner, CEO of Unity4. "We are pleased with the opportunity to expand our hiring efforts and look forward to increasing our agent pool. We are particularly keen to recruit in rural areas where teleworking can support local communities under pressure from drought." Ideal candidates are self-starters with sales experience, desiring home-based employment. Uniy4 agents have strong educational backgrounds, a work history that includes previous sales and customer service related responsibilities and good online computer skills. To learn more about specific employment requirements or to apply for a home-based agent position, please visit the Unity4 recruitment website at www.unity4athome.com.au.
NZ Telecom jobs go to Manila
New Zealand Telecom is reportedly sending part of its broadband internet contact centre to the Philippines. Telecom's contact centre contractor TeleTech will start to transfer its portion of the helpdesk service, amounting to 85 jobs, from Auckland to Manila from October this year, according to local media. NZ Telecom's media executive Sarah Berry said both companies would look to redeploy staff in-house where possible. The 240 staff based at Telecom's in-house broadband helpdesk would remain. Berry said Telecom decided to outsource the helpdesk as part of a contract review with TeleTech, and after that company's successful three-month trial using its staff in the Philippines. "It's becoming part of our business reality that we are having a mix of on- and offshore," she said.
NZ Government contact centre staff rate well, says new study
New Zealand's government contact centre staff have been given a tick of approval according to a new study. State Services Commission commissioned a Colmar Brunton survey into service delivery in the government's contact centres earlier this year. The report, entitled Satisfaction and Trust in the State Services, showed while 58% of respondents perceive the overall quality of public service positively, 80% view the overall quality of service they receive positively. The study found 40% of respondents believed the public service kept its promises, but 80% reported staff kept their promises. The NZ government is undertaking an ongoing program to ensure its customer service deliver, holding a conference last month in Wellington attended by 100 government contact centre managers where they identified the key drivers for a good customer experience. There is expected to now be regular forums for government contact centre managers.
ING announces customer service revamp
Financial services company ING Australia has undertaken an overhaul of its customer services division. In an attempt to streamline its service, ING has reportedly consolidated its customer service and IT areas. The new division will comprise an advice and customer contact centre, unit pricing, project management and IT services as well as some compliance, support and finance functions. The new division opens up a new position, chief operating officer, which current executive director of personal investments, Alexis George, will fill in the interim.
'your call' blog
Asia Pacific Contact Centre Customer Experience Research Ah, at last... you know I have been talking about this for some time.... my great dislike of the measure of customer satisfaction as the surrogate indicator for the customer's experience.... every contact centre I go to... every country we analyse... customer satisfaction is always about ... 83/100 (top two boxes on a 5 or 7 point scale satisfied-very satisfied) ...in fact, even a global report I saw the other day averages the global contact centre industry's customer satisfaction at... well... yes... you guessed it...83/100. My issue is that satisfaction is a mental deduction of expectations minus actual service received, which is somewhat useful, however it misses the key emotional responses that will tie or bond a customer to an organisation or indeed to a contact centre. Results of 83% also give little information on what a contact centre can do to continually improve. Satisfaction is a dated measure that should constitute a small part of an overall assessment of the customer's experience and level of engagement with an organisation's contact centre. So, I am extremely excited to say that we currently have in field a research project that will measure the customer's experience, customer loyalty and ideally what the customer wants from a contact centre, all from the customer's point of view. Lovely. We are partnering with Avaya to conduct the program in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, China, Japan and Korea. We will be holding events, as part of Avaya's annual roadshow, from late October to early December in each country to present the results. So stay tuned and we will let you know all about the program very soon. So excited.... :) Post a comment

  Research Services Provided by aca research 
  Read more here . . . 

::Do you have a Press Release or Article you want to submit?
::  callcentres.net | PO BOX 1490, North Sydney NSW 2059 | Editor: editor@callcentres.net | PH: 61 2 9927 3399 | FAX: 61 2 9927 3327 
::  You are subscribed as: dan@unity4.com