IVR Interactive Voice Response
This section of our technical library presents information and documentation relating to IVR and interactive voice response software as well as automatic call answering solutions.
Business phone systems and toll free answering systems (generally 800 numbers and their equivalent) are very popular for service and sales organizations, allowing customers and prospects to call your organization anywhere in the country.
Our PACER and Wizard IVR systems add another dimension to our call center phone system solutions. An Interactive Voice Response (IVR) processes inbound phone calls, plays recorded messages including information extracted from databases and the internet, and potentially routes calls to either in-house service agents or transfers the caller to an outside extension.
Developing an IVR Design to Produce Organizational Results
by Louie Gazzola
Consumers have expressed
dissatisfaction with Interactive Voice Response (IVR) self-service
applications, despite the high penetration of IVR’s and reliance on this
technology. Some industry analysts blame the techno-challenged consumer for
creating this negative environment. But with the number of cell phones,
personal digital assistant (PDA’s) and personal computers in our community,
this excuse is questionable.
A Customer's experience can
vary greatly when conducting common self-service transaction. This is based
on the industry the customer is calling and the callers own personal
preference. The common elements that irritate customers are:
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IVR options that are not clear and therefore result in uncertain
selections that do not satisfy their needs |
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The number of options offered on a single menu level that result in a
lengthy script |
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Being
requested to input information that is asked to be repeated once connected
to a live agent |
With voice systems not
performing efficiently call centre’s can be ineffective resulting in their
organization not being as competitive as they could be.
Why Implementing Self-Service
Systems:
Depending on your
organizations service and products, self-service IVR can handle 5% to 80% of
customer enquires without needing the assistance of an agent. Financial
institutes have had the greatest success with IVR applications and range
between 60-80% of overall customer enquires. Organizations that require
individual service or their IVR is not linked to their Customer Information
System (CIS) for real time information have reported usage as little as 5%.
Based on your industry and where your customers are in the automation life
cycle, IVR’s usage could be both a unique customer satisfaction tool and a
cost enabler.
A successful IVR application
needs to satisfy customer needs. Therefore each organization, based on
their customer profile, products and services, need to determine how they
wish to use this tool.
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7/24 access to information, is a positive feature providing that CIS down
time is minimum and account information is real-time. |
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Information is more quickly accessible then waiting for a live agent,
providing that the IVR structure and menus are well designed. |
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Ability to screens calls to correct agent group, for centre’s that have
multiple queues. |
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Reduce Data entry by agent when presented a call from the IVR, providing
that customer information such as customers account, phone number and
transactions required can be transferred to an agent. |
Along with improved customer
satisfaction and competitive advantage, reduce staffing requirements by
offloading simple/short calls from queuing to an agent is a cost benefit of
implementing an IVR system. The business cases used to cost justify the
purchase of an IVR system needs to include all impacts on the current call
drivers and business processes.
When calculating Return on
Investment (ROI), a reduction in call volume of 10% does not equate to the
same percentage reduction in staffing requirement. Average Handle Time
(AHT) for the more complicated calls is longer, therefore by removing these
calls from an agent queue overall number of calls handled is reduced and AHT
is increased.
The impact of a 10% reduction
in call volume calculates to just over a 5% decrease in workload and
staffing requirement.
|
|
Call
Volume |
% of TTL
Call Volume |
Average
Handle Time |
Workload (in Mins) |
% of TTL
Workload |
|
Short
Calls |
50 |
10% |
200 |
167 |
5.5% |
|
Lengthy
Calls |
450 |
90% |
380 |
2850 |
94.5% |
|
TTL Volume |
500 |
100% |
362 |
3017 |
100.0% |
There is also an impact on
agent productivity by removing short calls from an agent queue. The
remaining calls are more complicated which increases the complexity of the
calls and increases the stress level. As the work activity becomes more
complex, an agent ability to handle these calls efficiently is decreased.
This results in longer agent controlled gaps between calls, and a decrease
in agent productivity.
What should the IVR Design look like?
The main function of the IVR
is to allow customers to interact with other systems in your organization.
If your organization is not giving out personal information, you may wish to
review other options other then an IVR. Voice Mail, has been used very
successfully in providing generic messaging and directing callers to
specialized agent queues. Once you have decided which kind of system you
require to meet your business needs, the overall design of the system should
follow the same principals.
A few principals to remember
during the design of the IVR menu structure is:
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Keep the format consistent
and do not use industry jargon |
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If using repeat and default
to live agent keys; offer these options on the main menu. |
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When using repeat, return
to previous menu, return to main menu and default to live |
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agent keys options
throughout the menu levels, advice the caller of these options |
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when once they have drilled
down to the second level of menu options. |
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Follow the KISS principal
remembering that your audience will have a range of |
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knowledge and experience
with using your service. |
Depth and length of menu
structure should be uncomplicated so that customers can self direct
themselves from one option to another without hanging up and redialing. A
design rule that has been very successful is the 3 and 3 rule. This results
in 3 options per menu level with each level going down 3 sub menus (this
would equate up to 39 options offered).
Managing IVR Performance:
For centres that rely on IVR
options to offload call volume, system down time results in call volume
spikes, increasing queue times, agent costs and reducing customer
satisfaction.
In most centre’s, agents
statistics are critical element that are reviewed daily to ensure that goals
are achieved. If your IVR is a critical part of your business plan, the
system key business indicators need also to be reviewed and targeted for
success on a daily basis. Some of the key metrics for IVR success are:
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Transaction failure rate – This can be defined as the % of the time that
the CIS is not available and the caller defaults to an agent. |
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Transactions attempts - How many menus are searched till the customer
finds the application they require to complete their transaction. |
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Abandoned Rate – Customers that hang up prior to making an automated
selection to fulfill their request result in an additional call at a later
date or a loss opportunity. |
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Call length – A well structured IVR menu allows customer to promptly
complete their request, but a high % of short calls may not add value to
the customer enquire just adds cost to the call centre. |
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Customer delay time - Dead air, which is the result of long waits from the
host or internal IVR transfers may result in customer abandonment and
defaults to live agents |
Customers get very frustrated
after a few seconds of silence or delays, while prolonged silences increases
toll charges and will cause customers to lose faith in the IVR and default
to a live agent. If a customer experiences this dissatisfaction a number of
times in a variety of IVR systems, they will not attempt to use any self
service features. Therefore it is important to ensure that your
organization’s IVR is structured in a way that is user friendly so that it
is regard as a competitive advantage.
There is not much an
organization can do about other IVR systems. It is important to be
conscious that your customer may have had a poor experience with another
organization’s IVR. Therefore a call centre should be aware of this
negative experience and provide education and choice. Once your IVR is
implemented, it needs to be monitored and updated to ensure that both the
design and performance indicators meet your current customer needs.
Louie Gazzola has over fifteen years of progressive customer service management experience and ten years of planning & implementing technology-based solutions. He founded Advanced Contact Centre Solutions (ACCS) to provide an independent objective perspective on contact centre technology and workforce management issues. You can reach him at 604.765.2276 or at louie.gazzola@accs-consulting.com
Wizard Simplifies Development
DSC provides IVR software including our IVR wizard development tool for creating interactive voice response applications.
Our IVR software lets you increase IVR development productivity by providing a visual development environment. IVR applications can be defined in minutes using this sophisticated, yet easy to use development tool.
DSC also has available a comprehensive IVR software library known as our IVR Wizard Software Development Kit. This optional package is available for programmers and systems adminstrators who wish to manage IVR programs fromLinux IVR, Unix, or Windows IVR operating environments.
Data collected by your phone ACD (Automatic Call Distribution) or IVR (Interactive Voice Response) systems can be passed to your existing PC, Unix or Web applications through our phone software.
The PACER predictive dialer can automatically call your customers and pass only connected calls to your agents. With our computer telephony software, your telephone and computer work together to provide cost-saving benefits.
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