Case Study

Eschelon Telecom - Top Tier Service with TASKE

Founded in 1996, Eschelon Telecom, Inc. is a rapidly growing company with twelve offices in seven states across the U.S. Eschelon offers a wide range of telecommunications and Internet services, such as local lines, long distance, business telephone systems, DSL, dedicated T-1 access, network solutions and web hosting. With such an extensive line of products, it was imperative for Eschelon to ensure reliable operations, as commitment to their customers is taken very seriously. To help them fulfill this commitment they employ advanced call management tools from TASKE Technology.

Mr. Thomas Davis, Customer Service Center Manager of the Eschelon head office in Minneapolis, Minnesota, says that their office alone receives about 1000 calls a day and employs 21 agents fulltime for inbound customer service, with an overflow contingent of an additional 20 agents. Managing such a large volume of calls and keeping track of agents does present a challenge. However, Davis says TASKE Management Solutions makes it easy.

"With TASKE ACD Monitor, I can actually see the calls waiting on my screen and be sure they are answered accordingly. If our response time is getting too long we can quickly increase our number of agents so we are still answering 85% of calls in 20 seconds or less. With the help of TASKE, we've never missed our mark in the two years I've been here."

Davis says an important part of his job is not just maintaining a quick initial response to the customer but ensuring his agents provide a timely, immediate resolution to customer inquiries as well. "I run TASKE all day long on a second computer and with the user-friendly color coding, and interface, I can quickly tell who is on a call and if they have been on too long. We have a general policy that calls shouldn't last more than 8 to 12 minutes. When a call reaches that time limit, the supervisors and I know that perhaps that agent needs assistance to successfully wrap up the call and, in some cases, may require additional training. Knowing when to provide support to our agents helps us improve our service as a whole."

 

Knowing when to provide support to our agents helps us improve our service as a whole.

TASKE Reports are also a major factor in maintaining exceptional customer service, says Davis. "As a business, we can't just look at what we're doing this minute, but how we did this hour, this day and in the past. We look at the statistics in terms of things like reporting account codes, make busy time, and abandoned calls by day and by hour, to look at the big picture. Then I work with the supervisors to find out why we might not have hit our service factor and to make sure we're on track next time."

In addition to using the reporting feature of TASKE Contact in its Customer Service Center, Eschelon also uses the extension level reporting application to report telephone usage across the enterprise. In this way, it can track internal, employee-to-employee calls. According to Davis, while not often thought of as a major influence on customer service, this can, in fact, have quite an impact.

With TASKE, we have the ability to staff accordingly, predict future call volumes, and react knowledgeably to spikes in traffic.

  

"The time it takes our agents to address a customer's concern is a big factor in our customer service and in the success of our business. Therefore, if our agents have questions that need addressing by other employees, their speed to answer is equally important. TASKE lets us run reports to make sure the entire organization of 900 employees is working well."

All in all, TASKE makes call management easier for Eschelon. From controlling individual agent and queue activity to monitoring telephone usage within the company, Davis says TASKE even extends its benefits to detecting problems outside of Eschelon. If there is a sudden, unexpected spike in the number of calls, he can easily determine that the issue is likely a network problem. By consulting a few customers and calling the appropriate service provider, multiple problems that might have otherwise been difficult to analyze individually are quickly resolved.

"By being better able to diagnose the issues surrounding a call, we can respond to calls more quickly and more appropriately. With TASKE, we have the ability to staff accordingly, predict future call volumes, and react knowledgeably to spikes in traffic. All help us deliver a high level of service and prevent problems before they affect our customers."

 

 

This document is provided to you for informational purposes only. The information is believed by TASKE Technology to be accurate as of the date of its publication, and is subject to change without notice. TASKE Technology assumes no responsibility for any errors or omissions in this document and shall have no obligation to you as a result of having made this document available to you or based upon the information it contains. Not all telephone systems support the full functionality of TASKE Call Management Solutions. Contact TASKE Technology Inc. for more information.