Commio Agrees with the White House: Time is Money!
By the time one reaches adulthood, say, we all have dozens of war stories:
- “An expensive medical test was approved over the phone (after holding), then denied after the test. A dozen more calls (and hold times) yielded nothing, despite their supposed recording of calls.”
- “When the social security site locked me out, the federal call center unlocked it—but said to call the local office to find out why it happened. Each of three calls resulted in 20 minutes on hold, only to end with an automated ‘Sorry, we’re busy; goodbye!’”
- “Every single canceled airline flight has just been money out the window, followed by a lot of time wasted on hold and then arguing with a rep somewhere.”
So. Many. Wasted. Phone. Calls! The White House is sympathetic; in fact, the administration’s new Time is Money initiative is “taking on the corporate practice of giving people the run around, wasting their precious time and money.” Just a few of the areas they cite are membership and subscription cancellations; airline refunds (yay!); customer service chatbots and “doom loops” (the dreaded menu “tree”); and more.
Sometimes the issues are the result of poor planning on a company’s part—when the phone menu is poorly designed, for example, or the call center is inadequately staffed. More often, these issues are intentional. (Couldn’t get through? No refund for you!)
How to Protect Your Calls?
When these issues and delays happen to us as consumers, it’s aggravating. When we’re calling on the job, time is literally money. And when we’re contacting the telecom company due to service interruptions—i.e., customers can’t call in and vice versa—it’s far more money yet. (The cost of downtime for the average company is thousands of dollars per minute!)
The telecom industry is like most industries: some answer quickly, some more slowly, some have crazy menu trees. You might have to send an email or fill out a form before you can *potentially* reach a live person. A “ticket” will have to be filed for anything of note, which might or might not be a bit of a black hole. And some companies have support tiers—you may have to pay extra to talk to someone!
So how do you ensure your calls will go through?
Start by Being Proactive
Fortunately, there are a number of ways you can protect your company’s calls proactively (so you don’t have to call Support at all!). Some of these include:
- Branded Calling to Avoid Spam Likely – If you think your calls aren’t going through, it might just be that they’re coming through as “SPAM Likely” and people aren’t picking up. There are, however, solutions to ensure that they show up correctly. Commio offers branded calling, along with other options, to be sure your brand and your number(s) are clearly shown on every handset. So more calls get picked up and there’s no confusion about who’s calling! (Learn more here.)
- Inbound and Outbound Redundancy – The first and most critical step most companies take is to enable backup coverage with multiple carriers, either through multiple vendors or a vendor who offers more than one carrier. (Commio, for example, has more than 40 options customers can choose from.)
It’s also important to be aware that this typically only covers outbound calls, since it’s a bit more complicated when numbers need to be ported and so most providers don’t offer inbound coverage. It is possible, however (Commio supports both regular and toll-free numbers) so if inbound calls are important to your business it’s worth shopping around. (Learn more here.)
- Intelligent Call Routing (ICR) – Most providers offer “Least Cost Routing (LCR),” ensuring that your calls take the least expensive path. Others offer Intelligent Call Routing, which balances your calls between both the least expensive and the highest quality routes. With ICR, chances are you’ll never even know there was an issue! (Learn more here.)
- Call Transparency and Control – Unique to Commio, customers can monitor call routes and switch carriers in real time if they perceive an issue. (For more on all of these topics, download our free VoIP eBook.)
But Sometimes Calls are Necessary
Regardless of call redundancy and other protections you put in place, chances are that you’ll need to call your telecom provider’s customer support team at some point. Hopefully it’s just something minor, but your personal time is also money. So how can you ensure a timely response? Here are a few suggestions:
- Review a potential provider’s service level agreement (SLA) closely.
- If your calls are critical and a potential provider has service tiers, consider a different provider unless you can afford the top tier.
- If you’re using a broader platform such as a CPaaS or UCaaS, be aware that you can “bring your own provider” (BYOC), allowing you to have the widest range of capabilities while optimizing your calls and customer support.
- Know where a potential provider’s customer support team is located, what their standard hours are, and how critical issues are handled during the “off” hours; also, how experienced is their support team and how long have they been with the provider?
- Get references and/or read their customer reviews on a site like G2.com.
- Test a potential vendor by calling their support line!
The White House nailed it when they summarized their initiative as “Time is Money”—neither of which you can ever get back, and you shouldn’t have to worry about it. Quit your gym membership? No problem! Flight cancellation? Refund! Phones down? We’re on it! At Commio, for example, we have a deeply experienced U.S.-based team 24×7 that prides itself on answering customer calls within seconds, and we assume there are other providers who do, as well. The time you invest up front in finding the right telecom vendor will pay you back, so don’t put your calls (or your time and money) at risk!
Want to learn more about Commio’s Customer Support? Contact us!