Posted on

The March of IP Telephony – Part 2

It’s startling to realize how quickly IP telephony did get accepted. Even in 2008, when Rajan posted The March of IP telephony – Part 1, the bulk of our clients were using TDM boards. Digium and Sangoma hardware were our go-to choices. Innovators like those two companies were blowing up the market. This allowed Asterisk to continue to build on its foothold. Clients looking for stability were increasingly able to choose Asterisk, but still connecting via PRI. Selecting a quality VoIP carrier was a difficult process for those not sharing a colocation facility with a reputable provider.
Continue reading “The March of IP Telephony – Part 2”

Posted on

ACD Wallboards to Monitor Queues in Real-Time

In previous posts I have covered configuration options for ACD Systems and their Queues. Without the proper data it is difficult to verify the staffing are proper and configuration is efficient. While looking at reports to determine what has happened in the past is a requirement of any system, knowing what is going on right now is just as important.

Maybe you have a light indicator showing calls coming into queues or the queue levels like the Phillips Hue this is a good indicator of what is going on but does not show a full picture. This is where an ACD Wallboard screen comes in, perhaps it’s a large screen on the wall or viewed via the admin interface by any and all managers.

An ACD Wallboard can show the following information:

  • Agents Staffed which shows how many agents are logged into the system and associated with the queue
  • Agents Talking. A subset of Staffed but shows agents currently talking.
  • Agents Ready. A subset of Staffed but shows agents ready and waiting for a call.
  • Callers Waiting: How many callers are currently waiting unanswered in queue.
  • Longest Wait of a currently waiting caller.
  • Average Wait of the queue for the queue. This is usually over the last number of calls or a timeframe.

Usually there is a row or box for each queue and coloring can be adjusted to highlight queues that are in good standing or a concern depending on the rules at hand.  This this information easily at hand it is easy to quickly respond to changes in call volumes which require live changes.

Posted on

Number management in Multi-tenant call center software

In any multi-tenant call center software, tenants must be able to create, assign and configure their DIDs (Direct Inward Dial) in order to be able to receive calls and direct them appropriately. The DID itself is a convenient way to determine which way a call should be directed; to an IVR, for example, or a specific PBX extension. Software like the Indosoft Q-Suite can be configured to use a DID and a schedule to determine how and when a call should be directed, with the ability to specify a dialplan and queue during operational hours and an after hours dialplan for when the call center ACD is closed. Continue reading “Number management in Multi-tenant call center software”

Posted on

Inbound Campaign Scheduling in the Call Center ACD

Configuring an inbound IVR that takes advantage of queues and skills-based routing is a great building block in your call center ACD for Asterisk. Even though the flexibility of the Q-Suite’s dialplan builder is high, you may encounter situations where a single IVR just may not handle all of your desired scenarios. Campaign scheduling can help you solve these issues. Continue reading “Inbound Campaign Scheduling in the Call Center ACD”

Posted on

Real-time Agent Skill Reassignment for ACD Queues

Even with the best planning there are times when callers are overwhelming specific queues causing wait times to grow longer than usual which could be over the expected SLA (Service Level Agreement). Perhaps a marketing campaign is going viral and the response is much higher than originally thought, or a new product just shipped and calls are higher due to activate or inquiries about it. Knowing this was planned the call center already expected more inbound ACD calls and adjusted the staffing levels higher, but this is not an exact science.

This case is where from an admin interface you need the ability to adjust the skills for a number of agents to change which queues they are handling with which priorities. This allows a currently lower demand queue to have some agents removed or able to cover both. This may raise the wait time in the lower demand queue but if done correctly can keep it within the SLA for that campaign.

With the Q-Suite this is possible with it’s advanced skills based routing and Queues. Adjusting any skill for any agent is easily done from a single screen on the fly in real-time without any action required from the agent.

Posted on

Populating Client Information to Agents in Your ACD – Part 2

In Populating Client Information to Agents in Your ACD – Part 1 I talked about getting your client data into your call center ACD software. That’s an important step, but it doesn’t complete the task. Today I want to address the topic of finding the particular contact who is calling in and presenting that information to the call center agent. Continue reading “Populating Client Information to Agents in Your ACD – Part 2”