Johannesburg, 28 Jan 2013
Real People, based in East London, South Africa, is a diverse business that spans a number of sectors in the financial services industry. It has offices in several different locations across the country, which need to communicate both among themselves and with customers.
An outward-bound call centre with 350 agents, an inbound office with 80 agents, and a busy sales environment that needs to respond instantly to customer call-backs, all add up to a hefty communications challenge.
In 2007, Real People installed a telephony system that suited its needs at the time. Since then, the company has enjoyed significant growth and its clients' needs have also increased. In 2010, when it was time to review the capability of the incumbent system, it proved to be too inflexible and unable to meet Real People's changed business needs.
Word spread quickly that Real People was looking to install a new PBX and they were soon inundated with quotations. None of the 20 quotes provided the solution that Real People really wanted. This was when Real People's CIO, Morne Owen, contacted Clarotech on the advice and recommendation of another one of Clarotech's shift*eight clients. The rest, as they say, is history, because Clarotech's incisive systems are not only geared to Real People's existing framework, but also easily adaptable to accommodate increasing demand and customised development. This has been comfortably demonstrated at Real People over the past 18 months as the shift*eight system has expanded in synthesis with the company's growth.
The technology switch from the rigidity of a proprietary system to an open resource that is fully scalable without the need for any licensing fees, has unlocked many opportunities.
Challenge
To integrate on and offline communications across four different business units and to provide greater flexibility and ongoing scalability, without incurring licensing fees.
Question: How do we create a system that can solve each business unit's independent and separate needs, but still allow them to talk to each other in a single, fluid solution?
Answer: Clarotech's shift*eight system with the ability to customise.
The main obstacle that Clarotech faced was how to provide a modern, technological system that could 'talk' to old school environments as well as to more sophisticated urban audiences. In one of the units, the majority of Real People's clients come from outlying areas, where Internet and broadband are not yet available. Handwritten application forms and faxes are the order of the day.
Clarotech's Group Technical Director, Tony Russell, developed a bulk faxing system that is fully integrated with the main communication system. Integrating HylaFAX with the shift*eight system means that Real People can quickly respond to its clients' needs while improving operational efficiencies and client satisfaction.
After the faxing solution was installed, Clarotech dispatched and configured a shift*eight system for 50 outward-bound call centre (OBCC) agents to East London, as part of the proof of concept (POC). After being operational for less than five days, the outstanding results quickly convinced Real People's executive of the system's capability; 50 agents made more calls in one day than 300 agents had accomplished in a week using the proprietary PBX.
Since the POC, the system has been expanded in East London to include 150 agents in the OBCC, and a full production system for the Real Care division. The telesales centre and inbound centre for customer services, based around Interactive Voice Response (IVR), has been rolled out, which includes a secure, state-of-the-art disaster recovery system. In Cape Town, the cellular sales office has gone live with over 40 agents on Real Care. More recently, a shift*eight system has been deployed to function as a PBX and call centre for the Johannesburg office.
Thanks to the ease of customisation of the shift*eight system and the flexibility of the dial plan and reporting components, Real People now has full control over its telephony system and is able to install an appropriate solution at each of its offices. In Real People's Telesales division, in Cape Town, for example, Clarotech's shift*eight system integrates seamlessly into the company's own database and CRM systems, including software developed by Real People's own IT department.
The East London headquarters of Real People is now an open standards cloud-based enterprise with the Clarotech support team connecting remotely in order to provide real-time reporting and monitoring on the shift*eight systems. The Cape Town and Johannesburg offices have similar arrangements and have service level agreements (SLAs) in place to suit each particular office's unique operating environment. Comprehensive redundancy and exceptional security on the shift*eight systems ensure that all company offices are assured of business continuity.
Outcomes
Besides enormous savings in capital expenditure, there are many other exceptional benefits that require some mention when making the shift to a customised communications system.
A significant increase in productivity and profitability across all the company's units has been seen and tracked. The sales team has seen a substantial boost in target achievement; more calls equals more sales.
The powerful dial plan component of the shift*eight system ensures that there is little or no 'downtime' between calls, as it presents the next call after a preset wrap-up time; the 'human element' is thus managed to provide optimum efficiency.
There is scope for competition within each team. Easy tracking of targets and feedback on achievements has resulted in a noticeably happier staff complement, whose 'sick' days have dramatically decreased. This has, of course, yielded a direct saving on operational expenditure.
Perhaps one of the more unexpected pluses of installing the shift*eight solution is the resultant skills enrichment. Call centre agents and supervisors are learning valuable analytical thinking abilities with the information from reports generated out of the shift*eight systems. This, in turn, assists them in managing their own environments; it improves overall job satisfaction through self-empowerment and knowledge sharing.
"One of the key aspects to working with Clarotech and the shift*eight solution is that my team and I can get to the heart of the 'machine'. For IT people, this is a dream come true, as the transparency and openness of working with Clarotech means that we can get the job done," said Owen. "By taking all the different components and knitting them together, and by listening to our needs, Clarotech has formed a partnership that is dependable and trusted, and one we would also be happy to recommend."
Perhaps the 'deal clincher' for Owen and his team was the fact that Real People themselves have control over their own system. "Isn't that what anyone in business ultimately wants... control over our own efficiency and destiny? Clarotech understands this and that's what sets their product apart from the rest."
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