Contact Center Solutions Featured Article

Fonolo: Say Goodbye to Nerve-Wracking Hold Times

July 22, 2014

Anyone who has had to wait on hold knows how frustrating it can be; you either have to put up with listening to snippets of songs or music (that you’d rather not hear) or endure long periods of silence not knowing what’s happening at the other end. Tech Cu, a credit union in the Silicon Valley, decided to give its call center customers a better experience by replacing nerve-wracking hold times with a call-back solution.


"Providing a superior customer experience is a top priority for us," said Jeannie Sugaoka, senior vice president, support services for Tech CU.  

Tech CU began offering Fonolo's call-back service to its members in May 2014.

Fonolo’s innovative In-Call Rescue lives up to its name and rescues hapless customers from the clutches of ‘meaningless hold-times.’ It is a cloud-based solution that easily integrates with existing call center infrastructure. Quick to deploy and highly scalable, the cost-effective solution easily adds to a website, a mobile app or even an IVR or ACD.

According to Forrester Research, 75 percent of callers think the option of a call-back is "highly appealing."

If callers find hold times too long and dreary, all they have to do is to “press 1 to get a call-back from the next agent. There’s a two-fold advantage: customers don’t have to lose their place in the line, nor do they have to wait on hold; a live agent is on the line when the call-back is made.

"At Fonolo, we're helping organizations like Tech CU deliver an amazing multi-channel experience in the call center with Visual IVR, Call-Backs, Click-to-Call-Back, and Virtual Queuing,” said Shai Berger, CEO at Fonolo.

Poor call experiences can be disastrous for the company, as today’s customer has no qualms about taking his/her business elsewhere. Infernally long hold times are just not acceptable for customers wanting answers and solutions fast. The ‘negative impact’ leaves its imprint along social media and the Web, and the result could well be detrimental.

In fact, a survey by Call Centre Helper found that 60 percent of customers have taken their business elsewhere because of a poor call center experience.

Will hold times become a thing of the past? Will those periods of doodling end? Ask Fonolo.




Edited by Adam Brandt



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