Wilkinson

Company: BT BISCustomer: WilkinsonSubmitted by: Profile PRWilkinson, the fastest growing independent retailer in the UK, provides more than 25,000 product lines from kitchenware to confectionery, to more than one million customers every week. The success of the company has been driven by a simple philosophy that concentrates on providing the highest possible standards of service.Embarking on an ambitious expansion plan, Wilkinson realised that to continue its high standard of customer service, the existing retail support desk (RSD) systems needed to be upgraded. Company growth combined with an old system unable to handle the increased call traffic, meant that 75 per cent of all incoming calls were lost.Wilkinson approached BT to tender for the provision of a new call centre solution to improve call productivity and organisation.

The company’s 182 stores place an average of 4,500 calls per week to the RSD to seek help with customer queries. The RSD are the first point of contact for outlets when a customer service query needs to be addressed. After identifying Wilkinson’s individual needs, BT’s Symposium Express was chosen as the ideal solution to ensure that the RSDs could meet the needs of Wilkinson’s outlets.BT’s Symposium Express delivers the benefits and functionality of a sophisticated call centre in an integrated and cost effective package. The solution supports up to 80 active agents and calls are directed to the agent best qualified to help – via intelligent call routing applications. Customer queries are therefore dealt with effectively first time, based on the agents’ defined skillsets, the callers’ own number, own area code, or the number they dialled.

Call centre managers benefit from a better understanding of calling patterns, enabling them to effectively assign staff resources to handle customer calls and monitor staff and call centre performance in real time. Agents benefit from BT’s Symposium Express as their current skills are fully utilised. Furthermore, as their skills develop, skills based call routing ensures agents can begin handling new types of queries.Wilkinson’s communications manager, Gillian Reddish said: “The company needed to provide the most appropriate person at the correct time to stores calling in, and overall, we needed to improve the organisation of the RSD agents. BT’s Symposium Express has provided a clear picture of call traffic and intelligently organises and routes calls.

“”Increased productivity of the RSD is not only important in terms of customer service,” said Gillian Reddish. “BT’s Symposium Express has enabled us to schedule agents properly and as such, has helped boost staff morale and motivation as they are made aware of the increase in their personal productivity. Overall, the branches are happier as the system provides them with a much improved service.”BT’s Symposium Express enables powerful Computer Telephony Integration (CTI) applications to be utilised, further enhancing the service provided to callers and boosting agent efficiency. Wilkinson’s is now considering utilising this capability by merging BT’s Symposium Express with its CTI technology. Gillian Reddish, continued: “We expect to benefit from the integration of BT’s Symposium Express and our call centre management system.

We are currently working with BT to create a package that is tailored to our exact needs and budget.”