CSX, the Customer Services division of the MGX group has implemented the SMS321 solution in its call center to speed up the process of contacting its field support staff in order to improve customer service.
SMS321 is software that enables the sending of SMS directly from computer networks. Colin de Villiers, MD of CSX explained that fast response times to a call for help is crucial in supporting his customers. Every time a customer calls for help, the CSX call center captures all details into the call logging system, which will automatically generate an SMS message to be sent to the relevant technician. The SMS321 software then sends the SMS via a GSM modem to the technician. This is not only fast, but a low cost way of communicating - costs run as low as 15 cents per message. In general, it will take less than 2 minutes for the technician to receive the SMS from the time the call is received. He will typically call the customer seconds later to begin providing support, and arrange for a site visit if necessary.
De Villiers said "We have service level agreements with some customers that demand performance within 30 minutes." Using SMS is faster, and more efficient than even phoning the technician, as we send him the customer`s name, contact details, and short description of the problem instantly. If we don`t respond immediately to priority one calls, it can cost the customer a lot of money. Since we guarantee our response, and are subject to penalties if we do not meet guarantees, we need to do everything in our power to achieve our response time targets. "
"We decided upon the SMS321 solution from EconoServ for many reasons. It is a cost effective system, but more importantly it is an open system that allowed us to plug our call center software directly into its SMS queue very easily. It is a solution totally under our own control, so if there are ever any delays or problems we will know immediately.
Keith Levenstein, CEO of Econoserv said "Many people are beginning to see the benefit of combining a call center with our SMS321 solution. The ability to take a call, and immediately send it out via SMS is very cost effective, and can go towards improving response times and customer service. Because our system can also receive SMS, a technician in the field can indicate his response to the SMS call, by replying to the SMS received. This will take him seconds to do, and is faster and more cost effective than even phoning. Our newest add-on to SMS321, the SMS Task Manager takes this even further by constantly checking for an expected reply from a technician. If no reply is received, for example, within 5 minutes, it will automatically escalate the problem and send a message to the next person or group of people in the list.
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