Customer care centre recipe for success

A work concept that is oriented towards the employee

Problem description

In order to continue to be competitive in a newly liberalised power supply market whilst improving services, Stadtwerke Düsseldorf set up a call centre towards the end of the nineties. The following years saw it develop further into a service centre that now handles up to 36,000 calls and 2,000 e-mails per day.

Applying the call service 80/20 equation (80% of all calls should be answered and solved within 20 seconds) ensures a short waiting time and prompt handling of queries. With e-mails the target response-time one day. If a company wants to meet its target, it will need a constant supply of qualified staff that are available during service hours.

To ensure the number of available employees covers requirements at all times, Stadtwerke Düsseldorf makes use of a software tool that was developed exactly for this purpose. The workforce management solution from InVision Software AG was implemented in order to automate the scheduling process according to requirements.

Project description

The InVision Staff Planning System (SPS) has been in use in the company since mid-2001 following a three-week implementation.

The call volume for the period specified is calculated by the software by reading historical data from service centre’s telephone system. Once it has forecasted, the system generates specific shifts, and then the employees can enter which shifts they prefer via the Infothek module, directly from their desktop. As soon as all agents have stated which shifts they would like, the system distributes the shifts amongst the members of both teams, achieving a request fulfilment of around 90%. Because of the high number of part-time employees, scheduling at Stadtwerke Düsseldorf is quite flexible. Periods of time that have a high volume of calls are staffed in an optimum way. There are no queues and the agents are not overloaded.

Results

Planning with InVision is time-efficient and requires less staff. A capacity planner only needs a couple of hours to generate forecasts and create shifts for a period of time that spans from four to six weeks. Shifts are not allocated until enough time has elapsed, allowing employees to request preferred shifts. The planning efficiency of the software makes reconfiguring schedules unnecessary. Usually shifts are neither overstaffed nor understaffed, and employee workload is ideal. The planning period of four to six weeks allows the agents enough time to choose their shifts. The personnel planner can also edit the shifts manually, e.g. if an employee is suddenly ill, or on an unforeseen training course.

Dividing the centre into two teams with different functions and training is the basis for success, as well as the agents' flexible working hours and their optimal deployment. Other departments enjoy a reduced workload, as the agents solve 95% of all queries.

The customer care centre has now developed into a specialised service provider with very high quality standards. The technology and workforce management system contribute significantly towards this. You can see positive effects of this system by realising how satisfied the employees are regarding their workload and work schedules, also the good working atmosphere. The fact that there is no employee fluctuation also means that valuable business knowledge is not wasted.

The service centre is more than just a department that works efficiently within the company; it is effectively the point of contact between the Düsseldorf power supplier and its customers. In order to improve the customer relationship the service centre team has ensured their availability is optimised, that the waiting time is minimised, also it has added an e-mail service and it has sped up the handling of each case. The friendliness of the employees have also contributed towards customer satisfaction and the good image of the Service Centre. Its Executive Officer is very pleased: 'We constantly improve our customer care service. My employees have handled an increasing number of calls each day since the power supply market became liberalised, but we are able to keep the same level of quality all the time.'