22-Feb-2012
Australia Post has opened the first in what will be a series of new "super stores" in a bid to better engage with its customers.

The first super store opened as an expansion of a post office in Brisbane, with plans to open 30 by June in all states, taking in both metropolitan and regional areas of the country. "The super store concept is really all about Australia Post increasing the access, convenience and choice for customers in how they do business," Australia Post's Christine Corbett said.

The super stores will feature six zones for small business and consumer customers, including a face-to-face customer service zone, an "online essentials" e-commerce zone, a financial and identity services zone, a travel zone in association with American Express, and a 24-7 zone with vending machines and parcel lockers offering self-service options for any time of day or night.
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22-Feb-2012
Australia's largest family-owned wine producer Casella Wines has selected StayinFront's on-demand Consumer Goods CRM solution, StayinFront EdgeCG to optimise the service, sales and marketing operations within its retail and wholesale network.

Casella Wines CFO David Alpen, said StayinFront offers a system with effective information recording and analysis framework. "This will enable our sales force to develop better strategies to achieve heightened performance," he said.

The StayinFront EdgeCG suite has been developed to ensure the efficient capture of order information and seamless two-way transfer of customer data and delivery communications between Casella Wines and its distributors. Key to Casella Wines' decision to adopt the solution was the rapid deployment capability of the on-demand solution with minimal disruption to the sales team.

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22-Feb-2012
Almost three quarters of contact centres who do not use home-based workers believe telecommuting would bring greater flexibility by being able to add new agents and open for longer hours.

The ContactBabel research from the UK Contact Centre Decision Makers Guide also showed that 18% (up 15% on 2010) of this year's respondents use homeworkers, with 92% agreeing that the flexibility was an advantage. Benefits of telecommuting included increased agent productivity, decreased staff turnover and claimed cost savings of 20%.

Iain McKenzie, president of customer service IT company Enghouse Interactive said remote homeworking is becoming a real option for an industry that faces difficulty with recruitment and the pressure of 24/7 opening hours. "Cloud-based solutions are perfect for supporting homeworkers, enabling organisations to benefit from a pool of agents that can be ramped up quickly in the event of one or more facilities going down, seasonal trends or extreme weather conditions," he said.
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22-Feb-2012
Australia's regional lenders have justified their higher mortgage rates by saying better customer service is a better way to combat the big four banks.

Banks like Bendigo Bank, Adelaide Bank and Suncorp Bank, have been beaten on loan pricing by Commonwealth Bank of Australia, ANZ Banking Group and National Australia Bank, The Australian Financial Review reports. Bendigo chief executive Mike Hirst said competitiveness could not be judged on price alone.

"Competing just on price is a race to the bottom," Hirst said. "If everybody was price conscious there would only be one brand at one price." He said customer satisfaction and engagement rates at the regional bank are higher than those of major lenders.
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17-Feb-2012
The ACT government's Canberra Connect customer service initiative responded to almost 1.3 million customer enquiries in 2011.

"Canberra Connect had a very busy year in 2011 with more than 500000 visits to its five shopfronts, more than 5.2 million visits to its online services, and answering more than 775000 calls at the contact centre," ACT chief minister Katy Gallagher said. Gallagher said the importance of the service was highlighted in September when it played a central role in providing information to the community about the Mitchell fire.

"During a four day period in the fire's aftermath, they received an extra 8000 calls in addition to their normal daily workload." Canberra Connect is manned by about 160 people in Canberra. Independent research showed that customer satisfaction was 90 per cent for Canberra Connect services overall, with the shopfronts achieving 93 per cent satisfaction.

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17-Feb-2012
Bankwest has been named the overall winner of the Financial Review Smart Investor SMILES Survey 2011/2012 for its outstanding customer service.

The Smart Investor SMILES Survey 2011/2012 asks customers for their direct feedback taking into account a range of factors including; service, quality, fees and product offerings to identify the companies providing the best customer service. Along with being named the overall winner for customer service, Bankwest was named Best Homeloan Provider and Best Day-to-Day Banking winner.

Bankwest said it continues to focus on a strategy of Happy Banking by ensuring it meets the needs of its customers and "deliver innovative products and services that give our customers a great banking experience".
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17-Feb-2012
The former operators of a Melbourne contact centre have been fined $31,680 for failing to pay five workers $3300 in wages.

Melbourne man Mark Vincent Gulifa has been fined $5280 and the company he formerly owned and operated, Reacta Staffing Solutions Pty Ltd, has been penalised a further $26,400, following a prosecution by the Fair Work Ombudsman. Reacta Staffing Solutions conducted a telemarketing business trading as Big Mouth Malone with an outbound sales contact centre at Ravenhall.

The Federal Magistrates Court in Melbourne imposed the penalties after finding Gulifa was responsible for Reacta Staffing Solutions failing to pay five casual employees a total of $3326 in wages. The employees - four of whom were aged 17 to 21 at the time - each performed between four days and two weeks' work between August, 2009 and March, 2010, but received no pay.
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17-Feb-2012
New Zealand ISP Orcon has pledged that no local jobs will be affected by its decision to open a new contact centre in the Philippines.

The new Philippine centre will employ between 20 to 30 people and be managed by Auckland-based Datacom. The team will focus on non-technical enquiries such as account information, billing, and other general queries; while technical queries will be dealt with by Orcon's existing New Zealand contact centre.

Orcon CEO Scott Bartlett told reporters the new centre will help alleviate customer wait times, and improve overall user experience. Bartlett said Orcon plans to hire a further 13 to 14 new staff for its New Zealand centre. "There are absolutely no roles being removed from our business as a result of this call centre," said Scott. "This isn't us going through a reduction, if anything it's because of massive growth in the last year."

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16-Feb-2012
Bank of India (BOI) plans to will revamp up to 350 key branches in metro and large cities as "branches of the future" over the next year in a major upgrade to its face-to-face service.

The new branches will feature a "spacious customer lobby, pleasing ambience, self-service kiosks and separate area for high net-worth individuals with dedicated relationship managers". BOI executive director N. Seshadri said the new branch initiative will provide superior customer service to the bank's customers.

Seshadri said the focus is on upgrading customer services to retail clients and attracting younger customers by providing the latest communication devices at branches for transactions will top the agenda. About 70% of staff time will be spent in customer engagement. Staff engaged in customer relations will be designated as personal bankers.
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16-Feb-2012
Indian outsourcer HCL Technologies will open a 500-seat customer service center in Manila by June this year.

HCL's Rahul Singh said his company is building a network of centers globally to meet customer needs as customers look for contingency to a particular region. Singh said the Philippines' ability to "scale-up" was the primary driver behind the decision to include it in HCL's integrated global delivery model.

HCL currently has service hubs the UK, Northern Ireland, the US and Poland. The new center is expected to solidify the Philippines' reputation as a world center for BPO operations as the country expects to grow the sector into a $25 billion industry by 2016.
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22-Feb-2012
Australia Post has opened the first in what will be a series of new "super stores" in a bid to better engage with its customers.

The first super store opened as an expansion of a post office in Brisbane, with plans to open 30 by June in all states, taking in both metropolitan and regional areas of the country. "The super store concept is really all about Australia Post increasing the access, convenience and choice for customers in how they do business," Australia Post's Christine Corbett said.

The super stores will feature six zones for small business and consumer customers, including a face-to-face customer service zone, an "online essentials" e-commerce zone, a financial and identity services zone, a travel zone in association with American Express, and a 24-7 zone with vending machines and parcel lockers offering self-service options for any time of day or night.
...read more
16-Feb-2012
Bank of India (BOI) plans to will revamp up to 350 key branches in metro and large cities as "branches of the future" over the next year in a major upgrade to its face-to-face service.

The new branches will feature a "spacious customer lobby, pleasing ambience, self-service kiosks and separate area for high net-worth individuals with dedicated relationship managers". BOI executive director N. Seshadri said the new branch initiative will provide superior customer service to the bank's customers.

Seshadri said the focus is on upgrading customer services to retail clients and attracting younger customers by providing the latest communication devices at branches for transactions will top the agenda. About 70% of staff time will be spent in customer engagement. Staff engaged in customer relations will be designated as personal bankers.
...read more
30-Jun-2011

This report is in its 15th year and is regarded as the primary reference for data, information and trends related to the inbound and outbound call and contact centre industry.

Click here for more information or to purchase report

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14-Feb-2012

Stellar, a leading contact centre and business process outsourcing provider, today announced they have been awarded the contact centre services contract with TransLink with work commencing July 1st 2012.

Acting TranLink CEO Matt Longland said "I'm pleased to welcome Stellar to the TransLink network as we continue to enhance our customer service response for up to 1.5 million calls a year".

"Stellar are specialists in providing contact centres for major brands in Australia and globally, with extensive experience across a wide range of industries including utilities, telecommunications, finance and travel information services. I believe they will be a great information channel for TransLink customers".

Stellar will manage varying call and transaction types including journey planner enquiries, customer feedback and complaints, 'go card' enquiries and transactions, on the 13 12 30 customer contact number.

Melissa Hamilton, Stellar CEO (Asia Pacific) recently said "We're thrilled to have been awarded this opportunity with TransLink. We have a comprehensive understanding of the transport industry in Australia and we look forward to building a strong relationship based on service excellence and innovation".

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20-Dec-2011

Dr Catriona Wallace uses the Phone Channel to test customer service while also trying to buy a strapless dress.



 

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