Call Center Operation

5.6 Real estate 185

Chapter 5

Benefits

The following benefits were achieved:

 Maximization of the collection center’s performance at the lowest

cost

 An additional $50,000 in revenue each month

 Happier customers and better financial performance

 Reduction by 27% in the number of agents needed to handle com-

plex inquiries

 All incoming calls regarding billing questions directed to the interac-

tive voice response system first

 The option for patients to quickly, independently, and confidentially

manage their requests

5.6 Real estate

Company: Oxford Properties Group

Profile

Oxford Properties operates an extensive building maintenance organization

that services over 25 million square feet of premium office space across

Canada.

Challenge

Good tenant relations is a key to success in the real estate business. The

extent of Oxford’s real estate holdings required its maintenance staff to

respond to building maintenance requests quickly and efficiently. A recent

tenant satisfaction survey indicated there was room for improvement in the

following areas: ease of contact, response times, and satisfaction with prob-

lem resolutions.

Solution

To provide the best possible service experience for their tenants, Oxford’s

management team identified three primary objectives:

 Eliminate confusion by consolidating three regional centers into a

single, multichannel center

 Adopt a service level commitment for the contact center to answer

90% of calls within 10 seconds.

186 5.6 Real estate

 Establish a target of having a service person on site within 30 minutes

95% of the time.

To realize these goals—and to ensure that their building maintenance

group was a positive asset that would strengthen tenant loyalty—Oxford

selected Bell Canada’s call center project management resources to assist its

internal team in designing an innovative program, called 310-MAXX, to

manage the 30-minute service mandate on orders coming into its building

maintenance organization.

With the 310-MAXX program, Oxford tenants simply make a service

request call to 310-MAXX from anywhere in Canada or log on to Oxford’s

building maintenance Website. To turn their vision into reality, Oxford

Properties also partnered with Bell Contact Centre Solutions to assist in the

start-up and management of the contact center.

The first phase focused on preparing the new, centralized, multichannel

facility to handle the increased traffic. This included adding or upgrading

the following elements:

 Megalink Access Services

 PBX

 310 service

 In-house cabling

 A Symposium server and Symposium set installation

It also involved providing extensive professional services to help with the

hiring of CSRs and supervisors, initial CSR training, metrics to measure

and manage advances in the center, change management to involve contact

center staff in implementing “best practices.” This major corporate effort

was supported by having all of the key ingredients in place, including top-

down sponsorship from the president and CEO, a dedicated team of over

45 people who implemented the changes, the involvement of every tele-

phone agent, and training to close any gaps in knowledge and skills.

Benefits

The modified call center and enhanced communication resources were up

and running in seven weeks and provided the following benefits:

 Customers can now submit service requests directly, 24 hours a day,

via phone or Web and can track the status of their service request on-

line or by calling 310-MAXX.

 Once the job is complete, customers receive confirmation via e-mail.