A simple question, and one to start this forum off (seeing as it's been largely ignored up until now) would be "has technology gone too far", i.e. in the quest for increased automation and throughput, are we in danger of alienating our callers and therefore losing business. Whilst I believe that it's important to glue conventional methods with efficient and effective technologies, I know that it can be frustrating to be divorced from human contact entirely, as is the case with some call centresystems. I suppose it's a facet of the ever-upward demands placed upon our lives, e.g. time, money, etc., but don't you sometimes feel that you *miss* the human touch? John.

I don't know, a lot of the problems people have with the new technologies is that they aren't used to it.

Familiraity with old methods has a lot to do with reluctance to adopt new methods of doing things.

Perhaps the technology needs toimprove to a level which is suitable enough to allow the 'reluctant masses' to use the new technology willingly and easily. Voice recognition is established, but perhaps the technology needs to take this a few steps further to the point at which whole sentences are reliably recognised and calls diverted off to the most appropriate sections of the centre.

Jim (definitely going for lunch now!)

I think it boils down more to what people expect - time was when an operator would always answer your call (or not, remember the endless ringing line syndrome?) and I think people like that.

I know I do; there are those call centres that I like, and those that I don't.

The ones I like tend to be the ones that have a person answering the call (human contact) and no maze of button pressing to navigate through first. A good example for me is the Lloyds TSB phone banking service - usually, my call is answered within a few seconds (or rarely longer than a minute) and there's normally a helpful (if scripted) operator on the other end.

Call centres that I don't like so much are of the 'press 1 for this, press 2 for that' variety; when you do get through, the operator is in a hurry to get you off the line to increase the quota of calls. Makes me feel unimportant and I'm left feeling a bit hard done by. At best, I soon forget and move on, at worst I dread the next time that I have to call that call centre. Now, no names mentioned, but surely this is no way to run a business...???

Bob

I think the "voice prompt options are a great idea when making a call to a call centre. It's good that you can direct your call to the correct department, saving the risk of being "bounced around" from dept to dept. However sometimes you can be there for3-4 mins selecting options from menu after menu, any suggestions on a way round this?

Hi Rhona,

I think it's always going to be difficult to find a method that suits everyone. Part of the problem (as I see it) is that the design of menu systems within call centres tries to shoe-horn people's calls into one category. Life isn't like that; many times I've had a slightly unusual request and been a bit confused as to which option to press. Ultimately, you're then at the whim and mercy of the operator - some will 'pass the buck' and redirect you into another queue, whereas others will try and help.

I think that for the meantime, 'bouncing' is here to stay, sadly.

Menus are a good idea but not often the best approach to all situations. I like the phone-banking model, as I know that the staff there can help whatever the query. I'd hate it if I had to choose one number for balance enquiries, another for transfers, yet another for product queries, etc. The phone-bank staff seem to be trained in a broader sense than many call centres and therefore can answer my questions, or arrange for somebody from the bank to have information sent out.

Horses for courses, eh?

Bob

Could you live without the remote for the TV ? or that heavily used gizmo the mobile ? I think not.

Next we will be expecting some computer chip to do our work for us (that would be nice)

Chris....

Chris, I frequently have to live without the remote for the TV or the mobile, because I normally end up leaving them somewhere and forgetting where they are. But, yes, I take your point.

Why is it that the remote always ends up sitting on top of the TV - where is the sense in that, I ask you???!?!?!?

John

It's interesting how quickly the concept of wireless remote control has been assimilated into the modern lifestyle. I wonder if call centre technology will ever be as warmly welcomed...

I think WAP/3G may be the way forward - i.e. WAP-Enablement, rather than mere Web-Enablement.

Bob

Rhona said:

"However sometimes you can be there for3-4 mins selecting options from menu after menu, any suggestions on a way round this"
--
Rhona, I think that that boils down to bad menu design; I seem to recall that there is a school of thought that states a 'magic number' of choices for any one menu. Any more than that magic number is generally regarded as too much - after all, it is pretty discouraging to hear the immortal words "Please select one of the following nine options" - bythe time you get to nine, you've forgotten what the options are, and you risk callers choosing any old option as they're probably confused by this point.

I'll try and dig out where I read about that 'magic number' - maybe that would help?

Rob.

Hi Rob,

Something about your mention of magic numbers made me remember some guidelines laid down for interface design - the number was 7, plus or minus 2. This was the number defined by empirical observation and user testing to determinethe upper bound of information or interaction elements a well designed interface should contain.

However, that number (and I think it had something to do with the 'Norman Interface Classification', although I'd have to check up on it) applies more to visual interfaces, rather than audio interfaces (such as recorded menu systems are) - the rationale being 'let's not overload the user with too much information at a time and adhere to these guidelines to maximise the effectiveness of the interaction'.

Audio interfaces are typically temporal, i.e. as humans, we are not too hot at decoding multiple audio streams, so we can only listen to one 'menu item' at a time, whereas visually we work in three dimensions and can perceive and understand anumber of 'menu items' at once. This provides the visual interface with a context which the audio interface cannot have.

My memory is a little distant on this kind of thing, but I may have to dig out some topical titles which might help shed more light onto this.

John

Why is it when people talk about magic numbers they think of 7.Fair enough an average person can only remember 7 items out of ten, or 7 names, but when it comes to telephony scripts, who misses the first one, I know I do cause I'm Busy trying to geta bit paper to write don the other 8.
From Experience I would say 3 is best, with 1 digit for a repeat of the menu.
Then if you only have three in the first menu, how many menus are you gonna have?
Anyhow I usually press number 1 anyway and then get bounced around.

I agree with Charlie - three or maybe four, plus a 'repeat' option would be best - although perhaps someone could argue the case for more, depending on how deep into the menu system you are.

Jim

Jim,

I think your suggestion of three or four, plus a 'repeat' is a good amount, so as to be easy for the listener to remember. The other thing I think would also be beneficial would be a limit of three or four menus at most before getting passed to a person. That way, you've got enough options to separate customers into broad catagories, and few enough menus to keep them happy.

David

David Van Alphen wrote:

The other thing I think would also be beneficial would be a limit of three or four menus at most before getting passed to a person. That way, you'vegot enough options to separate customers into broad catagories, and few enough menus to keep them happy

You're right, David, but sometimes it's not so easy to categorise operations or actions down that far - I wonder ifanyone can point to a good resource for menu design?

John

Regarding IVR systems, my answer to your question John of an appropriate resource for IVR menu design is very simple - YOURSELF...

Its an odd world when those who design systems are the very people who complain when systems are difficult to use! The rule of thumb I concur is 3/4 choices. However, the number and the depth does depend on complexity and speed. Normally i would reccomend no more than 2/3.

The real issue here is not about the depth etc but of the choices offered. The best ones (read ones that attract least complaints) always offer an alternative (press 0 if non of these suit or hold for a human being) and always default to a person if nothing is pressed.

We ALL have said, "What an awful IVR" and yet designers seem to feel that the users of 'their' systems are somehow different, have different feelings from the rest of humanity...

The reality here is that if an IVR is designed from the perspective of a NORMAL customer, instead of solely from the perspective of the company, it can produce positive results and attractive few complaints. You'll probably have noticed that NO ONE ever raves about IVR systems. Its always a damage limitation exercise which should shout something to companies!

David

Good points, David.

What do you think about the issue of depth versus breadth? 2/3 choices is great, but in a larger organisation it may lead to several levels of menu, which brings into consideration the issue of backtracking and 'level navigation'.

You seem to be knowledgable in these areas, so I'm keen to pick your brains on this!

All the best,

John

Forgive me but your premis is based on the single fact that an IVR system adds value.

As a user/customer I have yet to come across a system that 'sorts' me AND then delivers me to a PERSON to whom i do not have to explain the whole thing all over again. Pray tell whats the sense in that? Further more one can then see exactly why we as customers are now describing IVRs with the word HATE in the sentances - along with call centres!

To answer your question, I think the issue of depth versus breadth is one that is overcome by understanding what it is customers REALLY want and designing their everyday needs into the system. BUT only if the team behind it trust it and appropriately react rather than starting from scratch each time which means peed off customers...

Comments?

David

David wrote:

"As a user/customer I have yet to come across a system that 'sorts' me AND then delivers me to a PERSON to whom i do not have to explain the whole thing all over again."

I'm with you on this one, David, but surely there arecertain sorts of calls that simply can't be classified enough - the 'intractible' issues, cases where the individual isn't sure into which category a query lies, etc. How can we design such a system when by their very nature customers are often difficult to 'pidgeonhole'?

"one can then see exactly why we as customers are now describing IVRs with the word HATE in the sentances - along with call centres!"

I agree in principle, there are a lot of less-well-designed call centres and call centre technologies, but equally there are some good ones as well. Of course customer service is paramount and I could hardly disagree with that, but too often part of the problem is that the emphasis is on volume rather than on quality of service.

Anyone else agree or disagree with me?

Jim

The point here Jim is that it is entirely because of these 'intractible' issues where the poor confused individual calling does not know where they 'fit' that IVRs are an inappropriate application of technology and exactly the reason why they should be kept simple.

Computers are wonderous machines. However, they are still as daft as brushes awhen compared to the human brain in the kind of application we are talking of here.

Computers work best, ie fastest and most accutately, when they applied to serial and repetitive tasks, exactly the kind of tasks a human brain is least efficient at. What the human brain does best, and computers perform worst at is making the seemingly random 'connections' between obscure bits of data and building something sensible from it. The following is taken from a book called WiredLife by a technologist called Charles Jonscher.

Currently (2000), the best computer in the world if you showed it a picture of a street with some cars parked at the roadsidein a leafy street, a van, a child and a ball MIGHT be able to identify one or two if the individual objects. A human being looking at that same picture would INSTANTLY tell you that the child was about to be run over by th van as she had chased her ball into the street. The human mind assesses the apparently random data and compiles a scenario that is 90%+ correct. The reality according to Jonscher is that just ONE human mind is more powerful than ALL the computers on the planet...

The point ofthat example is to try and convince you that we should be applying more appropriate processing power in places that it is needed.

When a person calls, often they do not know what exactly they want. By talking to a human being, who is prepared to listen, they will not often have to go into long diatribes to be understood as a few key words, coupled with the inate ability of all human beings, is enough to chase down what is really needed and sort it in mere seconds.

David