Integrating disparate processes to enhance operational efficiency

Northern Beaches Council, an amalgamation of three former councils, looks after 266,000 residents and almost half the beaches in Sydney. It provides a wide range of community services, such as affordable childcare for growing families, road safety, health and municipal services, and community activities for the young and senior citizens.

The merger of three separate councils to become one entity required a unified contact centre platform that could promptly respond to residents who need assistance. The council’s legacy on-premises system and IVR-based solution were ineffective in handling high call volumes. So, it sought to leverage cloud technology to achieve greater operational efficiency.

Integrating processes for a seamless experience

A major limitation of the previous contact centre system was its inability to seamlessly view a customer’s profile and their journey. “The old system could not integrate with our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, Salesforce, which led to an inefficient process and frustration for callers. There was no data look-up option available to our customer service agents inside the old platform, so customers had to spell out their names every time they called. This was a time-consuming and inefficient activity for both our customers and agents,” said Jane Kercher, Business Analyst at Northern Beaches Council.

The implementation of Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud in December 2019 has enabled integration between Salesforce and the agent screen, giving a complete view of the customer journey. This enhanced visibility gives agents relevant information to assess customer needs and preferences — and proactively assist customers.

Contact centre reporting, previously a cumbersome procedure that took supervisors almost one day per week to manage, is now available with a single click on the new platform. Real-time insights into agent performance and call activity are available to key stakeholders, enabling the council to reduce the time spent on weekly reporting from nearly one day to one hour.

Ease of scalability and business continuity planning

In the Northern Beaches region of Sydney, natural disasters such as floods and storms are frequent occurrences. Prior to moving to Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud, the council had struggled with its inflexible on-premises legacy system and business continuity planning.

“Immediate scaling up of licenses during emergency events was very difficult, almost impossible. On the other hand, Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud can be scaled up to additional licenses in no time,” said Kercher.

Two months after implementation, a major storm hit Sydney. It was a weekend when an outsourced after-hours answering service would assist customers by taking their details. This information would then be passed to the contact centre for call backs on Monday. Fortunately, the new cloud-based solution allows Northern Beaches Council agents to effectively respond to emergency situations at any time — from any remote location.

“Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud gave us the ability to quickly switch over the phone lines from the after-hours service back to the contact centre team, as our agents are now able to take calls from home or other nearby council offices. This had a hugely positive impact on the customer experience we were able to provide during this emergency incident, as we could answer the calls quicker and escalate issues much faster than the after-hours service,” said Kercher.

With Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud, the council can deliver superior customer experiences with swift response times when dealing with surges in call volumes.

Boosting visibility to enhance employee engagement

An inherent lack of employee visibility in its previous on-premises system had a compounding negative impact on Northern Beaches Council operations. “Agents did not have access to their daily personal performance metrics, like the number of calls they took, their talk time and duration of breaks,” said Kercher.

Using Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud has given agents and supervisors visibility over individual performance metrics and real-time data on agent productivity. Agents can now monitor their own performance in real time and spot areas for improvement. The immediacy of information makes it easier for them to deliver superior customer experience.

“Telstra Contact Centre Genesys Cloud is such a user-friendly platform and allows agents to access information with ease and wrap up calls much faster. The average time spent on after-call work has reduced from 27 seconds to 18 seconds,” she added.

In addition, the internal chat functionality of the platform lets agents share knowledge and foster better engagement amongst each other. Plus, integrations with the CRM and knowledge base have significantly reduced the need for manual work, contributing to a superior employee experience.