Call Centers in the Blogosphere

Besides this blog, there are many other blogs out there covering the call center industry. I've compiled a list:

Call Centre Confidential - Call Centre Confidential is my diary as a Team Manager. Next stop Bombay (and back).

Call Center Purgatory - Exploring the mind numbing insanity and childish corporate culture of an unknown call center employee.

CallCenterScript - Call Center lessons and knowledge I've learned from owning a Top 50 Inbound and Outbound Call Center for 12 years.

Medical Insurance Call Center/Customer Service Reps

The Off Shore Call Center Invasion

Asterisk VoIP News

Call Center Openings and Closings

This week we found 3 openings stories and no news stories announcing call center closings. It's a good week!

* Bank of America opens new Witchita Call Center

Bank of America announced today the opening of its new customer call center at 4509 East 47th Street South. The bank has invested more than $10 million to renovate and equip the new call center, which is approximately 50,000 square feet. Read More...

* Infinity Resources call center opening soon

Infinity Resources announced that it had selected Ottawa as the site of its next call center. According to a statement from the company and the city of Ottawa, the Itasca-based Infinity will set up shop within the former home of Reliable Business Products, 421 E. Stevenson Road, on Ottawa's North Side. Once operational in mid-October, the call center is planned to employ 25 full-time customer service representatives, as well as an additional 100 part-time and 60 seasonal operators. Read More...

* Seasonal Jobs Readily Available

Lindsay Curry wants something a little better than seasonal. But if that is all she can find, she will take it. For the last few weeks, Curry, 21, of Marseilles, has been seeking a job. However, after applying at a local temporary staffing agency and at a local restaurant, Curry decided she would take a stab at landing a job as a phone order-taker at the Infinity Resources call center, opening this month on East Stevenson Road in Ottawa. "I thought it sounded like it could be interesting," said Curry, who attended Infinity's job fair Tuesday. "Something a bit different." However, she hoped that she would be among those offered one of the call center's 20 full-time permanent job -- not among those landing one of the 60 temporary seasonal jobs, which Infinity will add to boost its staff to meet the demands of the upcoming holiday season. Read More...

Quality monitoring company updates breakthrough call logging software with encryption and unlimited storage

Coordinated Systems, Inc. (CSI), of East Hartford, CT, is pleased to announce the latest update to the Virtual Observer (VO) 3.0 Call Logger, a total recording solution, can now be bolstered with virtual unlimited storage, enhanced playback and media encryption. The VO Logger is expandable to include a full featured quality monitoring suite. The VO Call Logger works in most VoIP, traditional TDM, and hybrid digital/analog/IP environments.

There are many call loggers on the marketplace today. Many of the more affordable solutions offer basic recording and limited playback features. Many are simple hardware recorders requiring managers to physically visit the unit to view recordings. Many offer extended features at a much higher price and will often force feature purchases that are neither necessary or in the future plans of the customer.

CSI's approach is a bit different. As with their Virtual Observer 3.0 random sample recording edition, they pack all the important features into the core model and allow customers to pick and choose what other functionality they need. The VO Logger is priced for the mid-market, yet easily extends to the enterprise for multi-location logging to a centralized database. The VO Logger can also capture SMDR or CTI data for additional intelligence - as an optional add-on module. Certain configurations also allow for screen capture in a logger environment.

Similar to the aggressive pricing model for new customer solutions, the upgrade path for current customers of CSI is clear and inexpensive. Full upgrade releases are free for actively maintained customers and the only fee is the labor for the actual server conversion. This contributes to CSI's 97.5% customer retention rate.

The VO Logger comes optionally equipped with two significant features: Auto-Archiving and Media Encryption. With Auto-Archiving, companies can achieve virtual unlimited storage using automated storage and purging rules combined with a DVD recorder, NAS or SAN device. Events can be stored to any network-enabled device.

The Media Encryption module automatically encrypts all recorded events - protecting your important customer information. This also is a mandate enforced by Visa's new Payment Card Industry standard. The VO Logger with Media Encryption complies with this standard. Calls are de-crypted during playback for authenticated users. The VO Logger includes granular-level security controls to further ensure system data protection.

Virtual Observer supports a large variety of VoIP and TDM/Legacy phone systems: Cisco, Avaya, 3COM, Siemens, Nortel, Mitel, as well as any SIP-enabled VoIP systems.
Coordinated Systems, Inc. (CSI) has been in business since 1972. CSI employs a "Start Small, Think Big" philosophy that allows call centers to use a phased approach and still receive a high impact return on investment when implementing voip call recording and quality monitoring technology.