NORTH SALT LAKE CITY, Utah -- Maverick Inc., operator of the Maverik Country Stores chain of 180 retail locations in seven western states, has implemented Coordinated Systems Inc.'s Virtual Observer VoIP recording software to automate the quality assurance process in its call center.
Maverik's call center began as four people answering the phones, four computers and four phone lines. The North Salt Lake City, Utah-based retailer then hired John Patterson, formerly of Continental Airlines, to be the call center manager. He upgraded to a new 3com VoIP [image-nocss] phone system.
Patterson then found East Hartford, Conn.-based CSI, and the chain decided to implement its system.
Approximately two-thirds of the company's calls are internal, from the Maverik stores themselvesstore personnel requiring support or help with timely matters. The other third of his calls are external, from customers and cardholders. Maverik's branding efforts include a popular Adventure-themed prepaid purchase card program.
By the end of the first month, VO had logged almost 9,000 calls, although Patterson had only anticipated 6,000. During the second hour of recording, the system captured calls from people who had purchased gift cards with bad checks. They had called in to ask why their cards had zero balances. Maverik had zeroed out the balances of the bad cards as soon as the check had bounced. The perpetrators then called into Maverik customer service for help when their cards weren't working. An informed Maverik customer service agent asked them for their names, addresses and phone numbers. They obliged, with VO recording the conversation in the background. Maverik now had a recording of the information they needed to provide police with so they could catch the alleged criminals.
VO also helped solve an internal dispute between a store and a customer service representative. A store manager had called in for help from the customer service rep. The manager claimed the service person was extremely rude. After reviewing the recorded call, Maverik was able to clearly make a ruling on the dispute and clear the rep of misconduct.Members help make our journalism possible. Become a CSP member today and unlock exclusive benefits, including unlimited access to all of our content. Sign up here.