UMG, Teleformix Open Call Center

United Marketing Group has opened a new Customer Service Operations Center in Itasca, Illinois described by group officials as a "secure, 63,000 square foot, 200 seat facility housing a secure PCI Level 1 Gateway (News - Alert)" for payment card processing.

The call center was a joint investment by UMG and its sister company, Teleformix. It was designed from inception to be flexible and expandable, UMG officials say, adding that the facility was formerly occupied by GE Money, a retail finance program provider.

The Customer Service Operations Center operates 24x7 and includes customer support, operations and network or physical security personnel. A call center application built by Teleformix (News - Alert) records both the agent’s voice and computer screen to capture the transaction for validation, evaluation, quality assurance and compliance: "Advanced call tracking provides agents with access to a complete customer transaction history" as well.

“Giving our customer service representatives this kind of information is the first and the best opportunity to make a good impression,” says Alan Portelli, CEO & President of United Marketing Group.

A 2009 study by CFI found quick issue resolution is "paramount" to the success of the contact center. "Strong processes and highly skilled agents lead to resolved issues -- which makes for happier, more loyal customers," say UMG officials commenting on the study.

“Many of our CSRs have been with the company for more than five years. All our customer service representatives are KPI managed using technologies that eliminate opinion and bias to maintain customer service," says Portelli.

Last year TMC's Anuradha Shukla reported that Teleformix’s white paper “Benefits and Advantages of Recording and Archiving Calls” explains how the ECHO digital recording "brings a whole host of advantages, including dispute resolution, liability management, evaluation support, and more."

According to Teleformix, Shukla said, it is important to record calls because every individual and corporation has different uses for call recordings. In its white paper, the company cited the example of call centers, where clients or government regulations often require recording.

While some call centers use recordings only for quality assurance, others use recordings in weekly or monthly client briefings, Shukla wrote: "Also, in some call center, call recordings assist in resolving contention. Complete with quality monitoring and CRM, ECHO’s synchronized voice and screen recordings take the benefit of recording beyond the call center."