Connections Call Center Services

 

Gerry Smith is a qualified plumber who has always worked from home.  Being a one-staff company wears him thin, and since he has no full time receptionist, he currently relies on his home phone and voice mail to retrieve messages.

 

The problem: Gerry finds that when he’s checking his messages at the end of a long days work out of the house, there are a number of callers who just hung up rather than leaving a message.  He also often finds that his voice mail is full and he has missed the opportunity to receive further messages.  In addition, since it’s his home phone, even though it’s the second number in the house, it is used by his wife and children. He finds that they are often on the phone and callers get a busy signal, or they leave a message with the family and he never receives the details.

 

The solution: Since Gerry already has a second phone number in his house that was meant for use by his company alone, he signs up with Connections Call Center and forwards all calls to that number through to Connections Call Center.  A real person with his chosen answer phrase now answers callers, “Good morning/evening Gerry’s plumbing answering service, how can I help you?”   The Connections Call Center staff asks the callers for their full name, their call back number (and confirm the same), as well as details on what the call is regarding, and address information if it’s a service call.  Gerry has opted that all messages are emailed over to him every morning at 7am.  He notices immediately with the first set of messages, that the number of calls he was actually getting in a day exceeded his expectations, and he had the accurate details he required to call the callers back and meet their demands in a timely fashion.  In fact, on Gerry’s first day of service with us, his clients were commending him on his new service, as they no longer had to find another plumber when their calls went unanswered!

 

Dr. Steven Smith runs a small, but busy family doctor’s office.  He has a full time receptionist, as well as a couple of nurses who answer the phones for him.

 

The problem: The staff needs to take a break for lunch! And a there are a lot of calls coming in and going out of the office on a daily basis.  He finds that, even on weekends, the office voice mail is full with patients calling back to confirm appointments, as well as leaving urgent messages that he can’t attend to until he gets the messages on Monday mornings.  Sometimes, it feels like the phones never stop because callers are confirming appointments and making new appointments, while office staff are trying to call out appointment reminders, and get test results from the labs.  Not only all of that, but Dr. Steven also wants to be able to attend to his patients’ emergencies when they happen.

 

The solution: The doctor signs up with Connections Call Center and has the ability to transfer his office lines to us when they close for lunch each day, when the office closes at the end of the day and over the weekends, as well as during crucial staff meetings or if the receptionist should call in sick.  Connections Call Center is given access to the doctors online calendar as well as detailed appointment information; therefore patients can call 24 hours a day to book, change or confirm their appointments.  In addition, the doctor has set up an emergency protocol for Connections Call Center to follow outside of office hours, so the next time a patient calls at 3am in severe pain due to a bleeding abscess, the doctor is called at home, or on his cell and connected through to the patient immediately in order to assist them.  Since appointments can be confirmed, made or changed through Connections Call Center, the office staff finds they spend less time calling back clients they missed speaking to the first time and more time attending to their other job duties.  The doctors office runs smoother and more efficiently while the doctor feels confident in his customer service because he is now able to offer a 24 hour emergency service!

 

 

Beverly Sayer is the owner and sole operator of Sayer Technologies, a wireless internet provider.  Her business started off very small, where she installed base stations around her house and offered her neighbors the password to her network for a small monthly fee.  Before she knew it, she was making arrangements to install base stations in her neighbor’s yards, and her business started to bloom.  Eventually, arrangements turned into contracts and she was offering service throughout her entire town!

 

The problem: As her client base started to grow, so did the amount of communications she would receive both by email and telephone, mainly from people verifying their passwords, or needing a system refresh to insure optimum service.  She found herself spending more time working in her company, providing current customers with customer service, than on her company installing more base stations in order for her to expand further.

 

The solution: Bev signed up with Connections Call Center and gave them full access to her company email for customer service.  Connections Call Center staff was able to verify & reset passwords, as well as refresh base-station signals upon request, 24 hours a day. In addition they checked her customer service email account every hour, and responded to written inquiries with regards to simple service enquiries.  Connections Call Center could also send Bev a daily recap of all of her calls, and saved all outgoing emails so that Bev could scrutinize correspondence at will.  Bev also set herself up an emergency procedure so she could be contacted on her cell or at home, at any time should there be an outage that she needed to attend to immediately.  Her customers were offered efficient, quality customer service and Sayer Technologies was able to grow!

 

George Freeman owns a large moving company.  His big-rigs move people’s houses across the country.  Many of his drivers end up driving for multiple days on their own from one of his offices/warehouses to another.

 

The problem: Worksafe BC stipulates that any employee working alone in British Colombia the “employer must develop and implement a written procedure for checking the well-being of a worker assigned to work alone or in isolation.  The procedure for checking a worker’s well-being must include timed interval between checks and the procedure to follow in case the worker can not be contacted, including provisions for emergency rescue.  A person must be designated to establish contact with the worker at predetermined intervals and the results must be recorded by the person.  In additions to regular checks, a check at the end of the work shift must be done.” George’s warehouse is often closed during the hours that his drivers are making their way across country.

 

The solution: George signed up with Connections Call Center and arranged it so that when his workers start their drive, they check in with Connections Call Center and inform them of their contact number, where they are headed and that they would be checking in every two hours until they arrived.  Connections Call Center set a reminder in their account to call the worker 15 minutes after their check in time if the worker did not call in.  In the event that Connections Call Center  was not able to reach a worker, they had an emergency procedure to follow that started with calling the area supervisor and informing him, followed by George himself who would then start a search.

 

The Backpackers Inn is a busy hostel during the summer months.  Many of their guests are students backpacking across the country during their breaks from college.  Because of the nature of their guests lives, they often find that initial enquiries about staying in the inn are at random hours of the night.

 

The problem: Reception in the hostel closes at 4pm daily.  The hostel loses a lot of clients because no one is able to book them in after hours, and many of the callers are calling from payphones and do not have call back numbers.

 

The solution: The Backpackers Inn hired Connections Call Center to take their lines after 4pm daily.  With access to their online network, Connections Call Center was able to book new client’s reservations at a moments notice while on the phone with them regardless of the time of call.  In addition, Connections Call Center was able to answer general enquiries regarding the Inn from where it’s located to what facilities it offers and how much nightly stays cost.

 

The province is preparing to tear down and rebuild a bridge on a major internal commuting route.  Construction of which will require diversions, stoppages, and even temporary highway closures in highly congested areas.  The construction is expected to take the larger portion of two years to complete.  Disruption to both commuters and residents in the construction area is classified moderate to high, however completion of the new bridge promises smoother traffic flow, and quieter residential areas due to the construction of sound proofing along highways along with reduced traffic flow.

 

The problem(s): Construction will have to take place 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in order to be completed by due date.  A team of transportation contractors and government departments is handling the project and each has varying reporting needs, while different departments will respond to different community complaints and concerns.  The public needs information on construction activities, traffic information and general travel information, however none of the individual companies or departments is prepared or equipped to manage and report on all concerns, 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

 

The solution: The project contracts Connections Call Center to be the public's first contact. Connections Call Center arranges a general toll free number that’s advertised on road signs and published construction bulletins as well as given to construction crew members for reporting activities to the Ministry of Transport (MoT). A live agent answers the toll free number 24 hours a day 7 days a week. When construction crewmembers call to advise of current activities, the Connections Call Center agent is able to record such information and instantly forward to the MoT as well as to project department heads. When a member of the public calls the toll free number, the Connections Call Center agent is able to answer general questions about the project or current traffic information, forward complaints to the concerned department (according to complaint type and project specifications), as well as report on and contact road crews according to area or segment, when incidents or safety concerns are reported. Connections Call Center is also equipped with a project-specific dialing directory, in order to call out appropriate emergency personnel in an efficient manner should an incident occur. Connections Call Center staff are all trained on data entry on Drive BC, and are comfortable and familiar with reporting to the Provincial Highway Conditions Center (PHCC), as well as the MoT.

 

In addition to live telephone answering, Connections Call Center is able to arrange a traffic and weather line that dials direct to a recording reporting on current traffic and weather conditions.  This recording is updated multiple times throughout the day after corresponding with road crews to gain up-to-date traffic information.

 

Traffic reports including weather and road conditions updates are sent over immediately, in cases of emergencies, and at specified times throughout the day when non-urgent.  A general recap is sent to the project managers every morning for review of all actions on the HWY account.

 

 

Carsons Digital is a television, telephone, and internet provider in a medium-sized town.  They boast 24-hour live customer support as they know this is what keeps their customers loyal, despite their nearest competitor offering similar services at almost half their prices.

 

The Problem: Carsons Digital is a small company that needs to keep expenses down while offering competitive remuneration to its employees, and high customer service.  Though the technical support lines are very busy during the day, night time call volumes suggest it is not the most cost effective solution to keep staff on.  Most nights, only one employee is needed to manage all the calls and even that employee is left with hour upon hour of no calls and very little else to do.

 

The Solution: At 10pm when calls die down, Carsons Digital forwards their technical support lines to Connections Call Center.  Connections Call Center agents are given a list of common problems and solutions and are trained on the variations between a minor issue (effecting only one customer) and a major outage, affecting the entire or part of the main network.  Carsons Digital has armed Connections with a web-accessed database of trouble shooting steps, which allows the agent to assist most callers on the spot.  In addition, Carsons has kept an up-to-date staff on-call schedule with Connections Call Center agent to contact in case of major error.  The call out list is only ever called in event of a major emergency, so Carsons saves the cost of having a full time employee on all night, while still offers their customers the high-quality 24-hour live customer support they demand!

Adam Love is a Chartered Accountant who owns and operates a small but very busy office out of Vancouver, BC.  He employs two other accountants, three certified bookkeepers and an office manager that also manages bookkeeping for some clients with simple bookkeeping needs. 

 

The Problem: Most of the time, the office manager acts as reception and manages the phones.  When she is busy someone else tries to catch the caller before the call is routed to the voicemail.  This works seemingly well until the voicemail box is full or we enter Tax Season.  The moment Tax Season hits, workloads increase drastically as do the number of incoming phone calls.  People call to enquire about rates, ask about status of tax return, or call with additional information that may affect their return, etc.  The endless calls begin to feel like a disruption; despite being an integral part of the company’s growth and good customer service.

 

The Solution: Adam signs up with Connections Call Center, whose agents gladly manage all his telephone calls during Tax Season.  The office also forwards their lines to Connections Call Center during particularly busy times, or lunch hours.  As the first point of contact, Connections Call Center’s agents are equipped with general pricing information, location details, office hours, and other information to offer callers, in addition to a list of services.  This information allows Connections Call Center agents to assist callers in the most professional and efficient manner possible.  Messages are emailed to the concerned persons within the office upon receipt and a daily recap is emailed to Adam each morning at 6am so he can review the calls.  Should someone urgent need to get through to the office, (say with pending information that’s holding up the completion of a tax return in processing), the agents can patch the caller through to the office’s back line.  Problems solved!

The Cats Meow Veterinary Clinic is a small Veterinary Clinic with doctors that are known for their compassion and sincere love of animals.  They want to be there for their clients and prospective clients emergencies 24hours a day, 7 days a week.  They send their after hours calls to a voice recording which asks emergency callers to call a pager number and leave the details for the doctor to call them back and tells non-urgent callers to call back during office hours.

 

The Problem: The pager gets lost, misplaced, or even left behind and so is unheard. It’s not uncommon for the doctor to sleep right through the beeping of the pager.  Sometimes, emergencies go unattended to because there’s no follow up after the initial page.  In addition to this, clients often voice frustrations at not being able to leave a message for the office after hours.

 

The Solution: The Cats Meow Clinic signs up with Connections Call Center.  Every evening the clinic forwards their phone lines to Connections Call Center advising of which doctor will be carrying the pager.  A live operator picks up all calls right away no matter what the time, day or night, so no calls are missed.  Non-urgent messages are held over night and then emailed to the office each morning at opening time. In emergency situations, the Connections Call Center agent pages the doctor on call and waits 15 minutes for the doctor to call back to confirm receipt of the page.  Should the doctor not call back, the agent pages the doctor again allowing only 5 minutes for confirmation of the second page.   Should there still be no response the agent will escalate the issue by calling all the doctors starting with the doctor on call followed by the other doctors in the clinic. The agent will not stop calling until someone responds to the emergency.  By following this procedure and ensuring all emergency calls are tended to, the clinic is able to reinforce their reputation of dedication and devotion to keeping animals healthy!

 

 

Remax Tigers is a large real estate company working throughout the lower mainland.  With more than 600 certified real estate agents working throughout Vancouver, North Vancouver, West Vancouver, Burnaby, Coquitlam, New Westminister, Port Moody, Richmond, and Surrey, they are by far the leading real estate company in British Columbia.

 

The problem: Real Estate agents never sleep.  The real estate industry recognizes that people don’t search for houses, or properties on a strict Monday through Friday 9am to 5pm schedule, and making a sale often means making yourself available at all hour’s of the day.  Contracts are made or broken most often during non-regular business hours.  Realtors often book appointments to show listing with other agents after regular office hours.  And real estate agents consider all their telephone calls important, regardless of the time.  Having a couple live receptionists working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to answer calls, and dispatch messages to realtors would be costly and inefficient.

 

The solution:  Remax Tigers signs up with Connections Call Center, based out of Squamish, BC, to answer their calls after hours, on weekends and on holidays.  The office itself can remain closed, while each realtor’s messages are still paged to them immediately upon receipt of the same.  The office has an emergency back up in place, should their receptionist fall ill during office hours, or should they not be able to tend to their phones for any other reason, as well!  In essence, each realtor will get their messages in real time, 24 hours a day thanks to their contract with us.  Connections Call Center has a large number of qualified operators all waiting to take each call, capable of forwarding calls to another real estate agent upon request, or holding non-urgent messages as specified by the client for office hours, in addition to a number of other real estate specific requests.

 

Charmaine’s is a busy hair and nail salon in the heart of downtown Vancouver, BC. With 4 full-time professional hair stylists, 2 aestheticians and 3 nail professionals on staff, there was once a time when there was always someone able to tend to phones. A full time receptionist has never been required or hired to manage or book appointments.

 

The problem: Charmaine’s is outgrowing itself! Not many businesses would see that as an issue, except there are often times when all of the employees are with clients and unable to tend to the phones. Often they find the caller simply hangs up when the line rings until they reach the voicemail instead of leaving a message. When callers do leave a message, the girls on staff end up wasting valuable time listening to and deleting recordings, or playing phone-tag with prospective clients and clients alike. Often, in the morning, they’ll come in and find their voicemail box is full and unable to take any more messages. The current system is incredibly inefficient and is costing the salon both time and money.

 

The solution: Instead of hiring a full-time receptionist to answer phones and manage appointments, the salon signs on with Connections Call Center for a fraction of the cost! They allow Connections Call Center login access to their online web calendar for appointment booking, and keep their lines forwarded 24/7. Connections Call Center agents are trained on the salons services and pricing, as well as the calendar software. Reference materials provided by the client are programmed into the salon’s account so that Connections Call Center agents have easy access to information and are able to manage just about any caller’s queries during the first phone call. Appointments are booked while phone messages are emailed over to be read by salon staff when convenient. The salon owner has also left her cell phone number on file in the event of an emergency. Staff members are no longer distracted from clients by the ringing of a telephone, calls are no longer missed and sales leads are actively acted upon. The salon notices, with in the first few months, that their average number of new clients has increased dramatically!

 

Mike Willcox and Gary Shumaker are a two man pest control company, M & G Pest Control, who work on the go throughout British Columbia’s lower mainland.  They do not have a physical location, and in fact run everything through their online website and via email.

 

The problem: Written communication isn’t always as effective as verbal and their clientele seem to want to talk to someone in order to arrange appointments, ask for preparation details or to follow up on treatment.  Mike and Gary fear they are losing potential business as they can see new visitor hits to their website increase, while new client numbers aren’t increasing at the same ratio.  Neither Mike nor Gary are consistently available to answer a phone and they don’t wish to increase their expenses by leasing an office and hiring a full time receptionist for the sole purpose of finding out!

 

The solution: M & G Pest Control signs on with Connections Call Center.  Connections Call Center assigns M & G Pest Control a toll free telephone number for them to advertise on their website (and elsewhere), which is answered by our live telephone operators 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  Callers are asked to leave a message with the operator or are offered the opportunity to leave a voicemail for Mike or Gary.  Messages left with the operator are emailed directly over, and voicemail messages left by the caller are also emailed as a sound-file attachment.  Mike and Gary can both check their messages online at their convenience so that on their end nothing changes, while their customers are getting the live customer service they demand!