JP2005117620A - Contact center system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a distributed contact center system wherein a client terminal handles calls from a plurality of contact centers including various kinds of businesses and companies. <P>SOLUTION: The contact center system comprises a plurality of contact centers and a client terminal connected with the plurality of contact centers, and the client terminal comprises, only at a client terminal side, an application corresponding to the plurality of centers and a communication contention control function therebetween, so that an arbitrary client terminal accepts a call corresponding to the plurality of contact centers. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a contact center system, and more particularly to a distributed contact center system that controls calls to a plurality of contact centers including different industries and companies.

  A distributed or home contact center used for various operations such as TV shopping and complaint consultation is composed of a contact center accessed by a customer and a plurality of client terminals connected thereto through a public network. Hereinafter, one or a plurality of contact centers arranged on the network and their monitoring terminals are collectively referred to as “remote sites”.

  There, an access call from a customer to a remote site is distributed to a client terminal of an operator working at home, a satellite office or the like via a public network by an exchange or the like in the remote site. At the remote site, using ACD (Automatic Call Distribution) function, etc., a mechanism that does not concentrate calls to a specific client terminal, or when a client terminal cannot respond, select another client terminal that can respond and make a call. A mechanism for transferring is provided (see Patent Document 1).

  The remote site also has a mechanism for managing the status of log-on or log-off of distributed operators and the status management of each operator during reception, waiting for reception, leaving, etc. in real time (see Patent Document 2). ). All of these technologies are based on the configuration of a conventional distributed contact center system in which a plurality of operator client terminals are subordinated to a single central contact center.

Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 11-317817 (Japanese Patent No. 3179754) JP 2002-77403 A

  By the way, the contact center has a busy time zone in which calls are frequently made and a quiet time zone in which calls are not made frequently. For this reason, even if the operator is assigned according to the time zone, a quiet time zone occurs due to the situation of incoming calls to the headquarters, and the operator is restricted in time and place during that time, so it is forced to perform inefficient work There was a problem.

  As described above, the conventional remote site has a configuration in which a plurality of client terminals are subordinated to one central contact center via a telephone network or the Internet network. Could not be accepted. By the way, if the client terminal can be connected to a plurality of contact centers, it is possible to reduce the occurrence of quiet time zones in the client terminal.

  However, even in this case, there is a risk that applications corresponding to a plurality of contact centers installed in the client terminal operate independently of each other, and calls from a plurality of contact centers are received at the same time. May cause problems such as an increase in the number of complaints from the company, problems in the business of the contact center operating company and the operation of the operator.

  In addition, according to the conventional technology, since the remote site and the contact center correspond one-to-one, there is a problem that the contact center operation itself stops when an abnormality occurs in the contact center.

  Furthermore, recent contact center operations have legal expertise and require the placement of specialists who are excellent at handling crema. For example, in the food industry, problems such as mad cow disease and bird viruses have occurred, and inquiries and complaints to contact centers related to these problems have become more sophisticated. For this reason, there are an increasing number of cases where it is required to deal with items other than the products handled, especially regarding legal issues.

  However, it is difficult for small and medium-sized contact centers to make specialists resident only for calls that require specialist advice, etc. due to the financial burden, and therefore there is a problem that it is not possible to respond to customers sufficiently. It was.

  In view of the above problems, an object of the present invention is to provide a distributed contact center system so that a plurality of contact centers are provided at a remote site and a client terminal can be connected to each contact center. It is an object of the present invention to provide a distributed contact center system including an application for a contact center and a means for controlling them in an integrated manner.

  Another object of the present invention is to provide a distributed contact center system in which a plurality of contact centers are provided at remote sites so that a client terminal can be connected to each contact center. It is an object of the present invention to provide a distributed contact center system comprising means and detour means for detouring to another contact center when an arbitrary contact center becomes an obstacle.

  Furthermore, the object of the present invention is to arrange a common specialist at a plurality of contact centers, thereby greatly reducing the economic burden of arranging a specialist for each contact center, and at the same time, a sophisticated response by specialists such as lawyers. Another object is to provide a decentralized contact center system.

  According to the present invention, there is provided a contact center system including a plurality of contact centers and a client terminal connected to the plurality of contact centers, the client terminal including applications corresponding to the plurality of contact centers and those The contact center system is provided with only the communication contention control function between the client terminals, whereby any client terminal accepts calls corresponding to the plurality of contact centers.

  And a monitoring terminal for managing and controlling the plurality of contact centers, wherein the monitoring terminal sets a call control schedule information for each of the plurality of contact centers based on an operation plan of all operators. Has a function to realize. The client terminal further manages and displays a waiting call for each of the plurality of contact centers, a function for arbitrarily selecting the displayed waiting call and accepting a waiting call of a desired contact center, or a predetermined condition And a function of automatically selecting and accepting a waiting call according to the above.

  When the communication contention control means accepts an incoming call from one contact center, the communication conflict control means notifies the other contact center that the incoming call cannot be received and stops the incoming call. And a function for waiting for an incoming call again. If a failure occurs in any of the plurality of contact centers, the plurality of contact centers have a function of bypassing another contact center and causing the client terminal to receive an incoming call, and a function of notifying the client terminal that the incoming call is bypassed. Then, the client terminal activates a contact center compatible application that has become unacceptable due to the notification.

  Further, the contact center system includes a specialist terminal common to the plurality of contact centers, and an alarm management server that manages alarm information from the client terminal, and the specialist terminal includes the alarm management server. The call is interrupted to the call between the client terminal and the contact center indicated by the alarm information obtained from the above.

  According to the present invention, a single operator can handle calls from a plurality of contact centers including different industries and different companies only by changing the function of the client terminal. Then, by adding a priority control function for incoming calls to the monitoring terminal, it is possible to efficiently arrange the operators among a plurality of contact centers.

  In addition, the operator can select and accept any waiting call from the waiting call status display of multiple contact centers, or accept calls automatically selected by the system, so that the operator can be aware of the difference between contact centers. The operation can be performed. The operator's operation schedule is registered in the operator terminal, and automatic login to a plurality of contact centers enables optimal operator placement.

  Furthermore, even when an arbitrary contact center in the remote site becomes a failure, it is possible to provide a system with a redundant configuration that can be bypassed to another contact center, and prevent service stoppage due to trouble.

  Furthermore, by placing a specialist at each contact center, the economic burden of each contact center can be greatly reduced, while at the same time providing advanced advice by specialists and providing services with high customer satisfaction. it can. In the present invention, when an operator is in charge of calling a plurality of contact centers including different industries and companies by changing only the function of the client terminal, a specialist with expert knowledge of these contact centers By responding to alarms from client terminals with silent monitoring and interrupt calls, it is possible to efficiently arrange specialists among a plurality of contact centers.

FIG. 1 schematically shows an example of a network configuration of a distributed contact center system according to the present invention.
In FIG. 1, customers A to C make inquiries and other calls to their contact centers A to C in the remote site 2 via a public IP network (1) such as a public telephone network (PSTN) or the Internet. . Here, customer A accesses A's contact center A (5), customer B accesses B's contact center B (6), and customer C accesses C's contact center C (7).

  Conventionally, the client terminal 4 is subordinately connected to only one central contact center. In the present invention, the client terminal 4 is connected to a plurality of contact centers in a remote site via a private network or public IP network (3). Connect to 5-7. Thereby, the operator of the client terminal 4 can perform the reception work corresponding to each of the plurality of contact centers 5 to 7. Although only one client terminal 4 is shown in the drawing, a plurality of client terminals 4 are actually connected to a plurality of contact centers 5 to 7, respectively.

  In addition to the client applications A to C respectively corresponding to the plurality of contact centers 5 to 7, the client terminal 4 of the present invention includes an integrated control application that monitors, manages, and controls the operation states of the plurality of client applications A to C. And the competition control of the client applications A to C is executed according to the judgment on the client terminal 4 side, and a special receiving service or the like is performed.

  The monitoring terminal 8 is used by a central administrator to issue control instructions to the multiple contact centers 5 to 7 in the remote site 2 and the client terminal 4 connected thereto via a private network or public IP network (3). Terminal.

FIG. 2 shows a basic block configuration example of the remote site of FIG. FIG. 3 shows a basic block configuration example of a client terminal connected to the remote site of FIG.
In FIG. 2, the remote site 2 includes a plurality of contact centers 5 to 7 and a monitoring terminal 8. Here, in order to clarify the correspondence with FIG. 1, the case of three contact centers is illustrated. Hereinafter, the contact center 5 will be mainly described, but the same applies to the other contact centers 6 and 7.

(1) Contact Center The contact center 5 includes a contact center server 51 and an IP-PBX 52. The contact center server 51 is a server that uses the integrated database 510 of past customer information, and notifies customer information according to a request from a client terminal. The customer information database 510 manages customer information for each contact center.

  The IP-PBX 52 is a private exchange (PBX) system in a contact center that accepts a customer's telephone call via a PSTN or a public IP network. The IP-PBX 52 interprets IP packets and exchanges voice and data in an integrated manner. The IP-PBX 52 includes various tables 520 to 524, a call control processing unit 525, a communication control unit 529, and a table setting unit 528. Note that the novel portions of the present invention are hatched in the figure.

  First, each table will be described. The contact center determination table 520 is a table for managing the correspondence of the detour line between the gateway (GW) and another contact center in each contact center. The operator terminal schedule table 521 manages the schedules of the operators belonging to the contact center, and manages which operator performs which contact center service in which time zone.

  The operator group registration table 522 is a table for registering the ACD group to which the operator terminal belongs. The IP-PBX transfers the call to an operator belonging to the ACD group that received the call. The client terminal information table 523 is a correspondence table between operator numbers and dial numbers. The waiting call table 524 counts the number of calls waiting to be received at the contact center and transferred to the client terminal.

  Next, the call control processing unit 525 other than the above table executes an exchange service and switching processing in the IP-PBX 52. The incoming call source analysis unit 526 determines an operator to be activated based on the contact center determination table 520 and the client terminal information table 523, and transmits the corresponding application type to the corresponding application activation control unit 420 of the client terminal 4.

  The incoming call contention control unit 527 analyzes the notification to the client terminal 4 in accordance with a request from the call control processing unit 525, and 1) releases the client terminal that is receiving an incoming call to the call control processing unit 525. 2) Request re-waiting processing for incoming calls.

  The table setting processing unit 528 receives the operator's terminal schedule input from the monitoring terminal 8 and sets the operator terminal schedule table 521 and the operator group registration table 522. The communication control unit 529 performs communication control such as input / output of IP packets in the IP-PBX 52.

(2) Monitoring terminal The monitoring terminal 8 is a terminal used by a central administrator who issues control instructions to the contact centers 5 to 7 and the client terminal 4 in the remote site. The all operator terminal schedule table 801 is a table for managing all operator terminal schedules in the remote site 2.

  Further, the schedule determination control unit 802 sets the contact center information, the operator information, and the schedule information input from the monitoring terminal by the central administrator in the all operator terminal schedule table 801, and the set information. And a function of notifying the IP-PBX 52 in the remote site 2. Then, the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 executes communication processing with the communication control unit 529 of the IP-PBX 52 and the communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4.

(3) Client Terminal A client terminal 4 shown in FIG. 3 is connected to a plurality of contact centers 5 to 7 via a private network or the Internet 3, and a plurality of applications 43 to 44 corresponding to the contact centers 5 to 7, respectively. It has.

  The corresponding application activation table 421 is a table that associates the activation application type received from each contact center 5 to 7 with the applications 43 to 44 activated in the client. In addition, the corresponding application activation control unit 420 refers to the corresponding application activation table 421 based on the activation application type received from the incoming call source analysis unit 526 of the contact center 5 to 7, and activates the activation applications 43 to 44 is determined.

  For example, the client application 43 controls contention between the telephone control unit A (430) and the main body 432 of the application A used with the contact center A (5) and calls from other contact centers 6 to 7. And incoming call contention control A (431) to be performed. Other client applications 44 have the same configuration.

  The telephone control unit A (430) performs telephone control with the contact center A (5) in accordance with a request from the application control processing unit 450 of the integrated control application 45. The incoming call contention control A (431) sends an incoming call contention notification to the IP-PBX 52 of the contact center A (5).

  Next, the integrated control application 45 is a characteristic part of the present invention that performs integrated control of the client applications 432 to 442 corresponding to the contact center. The application control processing unit 450 monitors the state change of each application 432 to 442 and notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the change. Further, control and status monitoring of the applications 432 to 442 are performed in accordance with instructions from a sign-on schedule management control unit 454 and a terminal status management control unit 452 described below. Furthermore, control which starts the applications 432-442 corresponding to a contact center is performed.

  The terminal state management control unit 452 determines a control event for the application control processing unit 450 with reference to the terminal state management table 453 that manages the state of each terminal. Further, the Sign-on schedule management control unit 454 obtains an operator terminal schedule via the application control processing unit 450, the communication control unit 41, and the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 of the monitoring terminal 8, and the operator terminal schedule is obtained. The application control processing unit 450 is instructed to start the applications 432 to 442 corresponding to the contact center.

  The contact center application correspondence table 455 manages applications 432 to 442 corresponding to contact centers. Then, as shown in FIG. 8 described later, the contact center state display unit 451 displays the “number of waiting calls” and “seat button” of the connected contact centers 5 to 7 on the screen of the client terminal, When the operator presses the seat button, the application control processing unit 450 is notified of “press the seat button”.

  Hereinafter, based on the description of FIGS. 2 and 3 described above, several embodiments will be described on the premise of the distributed contact center system configuration of FIG.

(A) Incoming Conflict Control (A-1) Multiple Application Competitive Control First, customer A dials the telephone number of contact center A (5) and arrives at IP-PBX 52 of contact center 5. The incoming call is transferred to the client terminal 4 determined by the call control processing unit 525 of the IP-PBX 52 with the destination client terminal 4 being determined via the communication control unit 529.

  The transferred call arrives at the telephone control unit A430 via the communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4, and the application A (432) of the activated client application A (43) is set to the incoming state. The application control processing unit 450 of the integrated control application 45 that monitors the operation status of each of the client applications 43 to 44 detects an incoming call to the application A (432), and notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the detection state “ Notify as incoming.

  The terminal state management control unit 452 refers to the terminal state management table 453 based on the notified detection state, and determines a monitoring state for the applications 432 to 442 and a control event for the applications 432 to 442. In this case, since the detection state is “incoming”, the control event is determined as “pop-up event to the screen” to the application 432, and the monitoring state is “acceptance end (disconnect button pressed display)” of the application 432 and other “Monitoring stop” for the applications B to C is determined.

  Next, the terminal state management control unit 452 returns the determined monitoring state and control event to the application control processing unit 450. The application control processing unit 450 sends a “pop-up event to the screen” to the application A (432) in response to the returned control event, and the operator can start acceptance by activating the client application A (43). Like that.

  The application control processing unit 450 further monitors that the application 432 enters the “acceptance end” state, and at the same time, stops the state monitoring of the other applications B to C so as not to detect “incoming”. Thereafter, when the operator of the client terminal 4 finishes accepting the incoming call and presses the “Cut button”, the application 432 transitions to a cut button pressed state.

  The application control processing unit 450 detects the pressing of the “cut button” and notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the detection state as “acceptance end”. The terminal state management control unit 452 refers to the terminal state management table 453 based on the notified detection state, determines an event for the application 432 as a “sitting event”, and sets the monitoring state for all the applications A to C as “incoming”. decide.

  Then, the terminal state management control unit 452 returns the determined monitoring state and control event to the application control processing unit 450. The application control processing unit 450 sends a “seating event” to the application A (432) in response to the returned control event, and monitors all the applications A to C to be in the “incoming” state. Wait for an incoming call from ~ C.

  As described above, only the application having received "incoming" is operated until the "acceptance end", and other applications are not operated, thereby controlling the competition among the plurality of client applications 43 to 44 (431 to 441). To implement.

(A-2) Prevention of unnecessary incoming call processing In the following, unnecessary incoming call processing is combined with an embodiment in which the status monitoring of the other applications B to C described above is stopped to prevent detection of “incoming calls”. An embodiment for preventing the occurrence of this will also be described. When the terminal state management control unit 452 determines the monitoring state and control event for the applications A (432) to C (442) based on the notification of the detection state “incoming”, the control event for the other applications B and C is “released”. "Seat event" and the monitoring state is determined as "monitoring stop".

  Next, the terminal state management control unit 452 returns the determined monitoring state and control event to the application control processing unit 450. The application control processing unit 450 sends a “seating event” to the other applications B and C. Furthermore, the application control processing unit 450 stops the status monitoring of the other applications B and C according to the returned monitoring status.

  When receiving the “seating event”, the other applications B and C simulate the operation of pressing the “seating button” of the application and transition to the seized state, and the communication control unit 41 displays the “seating event”. Then, the data is sent to the communication control units 629 and 729 in the IP-PBXs 62 and 72 of the respective contact centers B (6) and C (7). Here, the block reference number “5xx” of the contact center A (5) in FIG. 2 is changed to the block reference numbers “6xx” and “7xx” of the contact centers B (6) and C (7). .

  The “seating event” is notified to the call control processing units 625 and 725 via the communication control units 629 and 729 of the IP-PBXs 62 and 72, and the call control processing units 625 and 725 transmit by the “seating event”. The original client terminal 4 is set in the “seated” state. The call control processing units 625 and 725 stop the transfer of the incoming call to the client terminal 4 while the transmission source client terminal 4 is in the away state.

  As a result, it is possible to prevent an incoming call process from occurring in the client terminal 4 due to unnecessary incoming calls from the contact centers B (6) and C (7).

(A-3) Contact Center Waiting Process Here, an embodiment in which calls from a plurality of contact centers A (5) and B (6) arrive at one client terminal 4 almost simultaneously will be described. In this case, for example, the client terminal 4 accepts only an incoming call from a contact center that has been received first, and notifies the contact center having a later incoming call that “cannot receive a call”. Upon receiving the notification, the contact center once terminates the call and makes a transition to the “waiting” state.

  As an example, a case will be described where the client terminal 4 receives an incoming call from the contact center A (5) and the client application C (442) receives an incoming call while the client application A (432) accepts the incoming call. When the application 442 enters an incoming state, the application control processing unit 450 of the integrated control application 45 detects that the application 442 has received an incoming call, and notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the detected state as “incoming”.

  The terminal state management control unit 452 refers to the terminal state management table 453 based on the notified detection state, determines an event for the application C (442) as an “incoming conflict event”, and returns the event to the application control processing unit 450. The application control processing unit 450 sends an “incoming conflict event” to the application 442 according to the returned control event, whereby the application 442 activates the incoming conflict control 441.

  The incoming call contention control 441 sends an “incoming call contention event” to the communication control unit 729 of the IP-PBX 72 of the contact center C (7) through the communication control unit 41. Here, the block reference code “5xx” of the contact center A (5) in FIG. 2 is changed to the block reference code “7xx” of the contact center C (7).

  The “arrival competition event” is notified to the call control processing unit 725 via the communication control unit 729. The call control processing unit 725 activates the incoming call contention control 727 to perform incoming call contention processing. The incoming call contention control 727 immediately stops the incoming call by “Automatic-Busy-out” etc. that waits for a certain time on the contact center side and then stops the incoming call of the unanswered call and waits again, and waits for the call again. During this period, existing services are executed.

  From this, waiting for the end of the acceptance of the previous incoming call, the operator can respond to the subsequent incoming call, or immediately cancel the unnecessary incoming call without waiting for service execution such as "Automatic-Busy-out" It is possible to wait for an incoming call again.

(B) Optimal operator arrangement The central manager inputs an operation schedule (contact center number, date, operator number, working hours, operator group number) for each operator from the monitoring terminal 8. Moreover, the time (schedule transfer time) at which the operator terminal schedule is transferred to each contact center is input for each contact center.

FIG. 4 shows an example of the all operator terminal schedule table 801.
As shown in FIG. 4, in the all operator terminal schedule table 801, the contact center operator terminal schedule is searched from “contact center number” and “date information”, and the operator terminal schedule is searched by adding “operator number” to it. It is configured to be able to. The operator terminal schedule includes information such as “date information”, “operator information”, “working time information”, and “operator group number” for each operator.

  The schedule determination control unit 802 searches the all operator terminal schedule table 801 using the above-described operation schedule and date information as input information (date (input information) value starting from January 1) as a search key. The information is transferred to the corresponding contact center via the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803, and the contact center information, date information, operator information, working time information, operator group number, etc. are set as the operator terminal schedule.

  In addition, the schedule determination control unit 802 sets the above-described schedule transfer time which is the contact center number and input information in the transmission activation schedule table placed therein. Then, “start time = schedule transfer time” and “start program = schedule determination control unit 802” are set in the task manager of the monitoring terminal 8.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the transmission activation schedule table.
As shown in FIG. 5, the transfer time to each contact center is acquired using “contact center number” as a search key.

  The schedule determination control unit 802 is activated from the task manager of the monitoring terminal 8 at the activation time set above. The schedule determination control unit 802 compares the “schedule transfer time” in the transmission activation schedule table with the current time, and extracts the “contact center number” in which they match. The entire operator terminal schedule table 801 is searched with the extracted contact center number and date information, and the operator terminal schedule for each contact center 5 to 7 is extracted.

  The extracted operator terminal schedule for each contact center is transmitted to the table setting processing unit 528 of the IP-PBX 52 via the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 and the communication control unit 529 of each contact center 5-7. The table setting processing unit 528 sets the received operator terminal schedule for each contact center in the operator group registration table 532 and the operator terminal schedule table 521, respectively.

  Thereby, the optimal operator arrangement according to the operator operation plan becomes possible under the control of the central manager.

(C) Automatic start of application and automatic login As shown in FIG. 3, here, it is assumed that the application control processing unit 450 of the integrated control application 45 is set to be started by the startup of the client terminal 4. When the client terminal 4 is powered on, the application control processing unit 45 is activated by startup, and the local operator number is used as input information via the communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4 and the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 of the monitoring terminal 8. The schedule determination control unit 802 is activated.

  The schedule determination control unit 802 extracts the operator terminal schedule corresponding to the operator number from the all operator terminal schedule table (see FIG. 5) with the operator number as an input. Then, the extracted operator terminal schedule is notified to the application control processing unit 450 via the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 and the communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4.

  The application control processing unit 450 activates the Sign-On schedule management control unit 454 using the received operator terminal schedule as input information. The Sign-On schedule management control unit 454 has the “Working time 1 start” and “Contact center number” of the operator terminal schedule received in “Sign-On time” and “Contact center number” of the Sign-On schedule data of the internal data. "Is set respectively. Next, “start program = Sign-On schedule management control unit 454” and “start time = start of working time 1” are set in the task manager of the client terminal 4.

FIG. 6 shows an example of the Sign-On schedule data.
As shown in FIG. 6, “Sign-On time (work start time)” is acquired using “contact center number” as a search key, and a corresponding program for each contact center is started at that time.

  When the task manager of the client terminal 4 starts the Sign-On schedule management control unit 454 at the set startup time, the Sign-On schedule management control unit 454 searches the internal Sign-On schedule data with the current time. The matching “contact center number” is extracted. Then, the application control processing unit 450 is activated using the extracted contact center number as input information.

  The application control processing unit 450 extracts and starts the application number (AP-NO) corresponding to the contact center number of the input information and the application from the contact center application correspondence table 455 using “contact center number” as a search key. . Further, the login registration table in the application control table of the terminal state management table 453 is indexed by “AP-NO”, and “login name” and “password” are extracted.

FIG. 7 shows a configuration example of the terminal state management table 453.
As shown in FIG. 7, the terminal state management table 453 is divided into a terminal state management table for managing the operation state of the terminal and an application control table for controlling state transitions of applications operating on the terminal. The application control table includes a login registration table. By indexing the login registration table with “AP-NO”, the registered “login name” and “password” are extracted.

  When the application control processing unit 450 monitors the logon prompt of the activated application and detects the logon prompt, the application control processing unit 450 sets the extracted “login name” and “password” in the text box of the logon prompt and executes them.

  As a result, the contact center compatible application that matches the operator terminal schedule is automatically started and automatic login is possible.

(D) Selection of a waiting call in a contact center First, for comparison with the present invention, an operation of selecting a waiting call in a conventional system will be briefly described. As an example, when there is an incoming call at the contact center A (5), the call control processing unit 525 of the contact center 5 counts up the “number of waiting calls”, and the number of waiting calls is stored in the waiting call table 524. .

  The call control processing unit 525 periodically monitors the waiting call table 524, and edits the waiting call lamp or the display display notification of the waiting call number when there is a change in the waiting call number, and the communication control unit of the IP-PBX 52 The communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4 is notified via 529. This notification is notified to the application A (432) through the communication control unit 41 and the telephone control unit A (431), and the application A displays “the number of waiting calls” on the display screen of the application according to the notified information.

  On the other hand, in the waiting call selection operation according to the present invention, the terminal state management control unit 452 of the client terminal 4 periodically monitors the waiting calls of all the applications 432 to 442 via the application control processing unit 450, and Each “waiting call number” is stored in the terminal state management table 453, and the state of the terminal state management table 453 is notified to the contact center state display unit 451 via the application control processing unit 450, and the contact center state display screen is displayed. Display it.

FIG. 8 shows an example of a contact center state display screen.
As shown in FIG. 8, “waiting call number” and “seat button” are displayed on the screen corresponding to the applications of the contact centers A (5) to C (7), and “client seat button” for the client terminal 4 is displayed. Is displayed. The operator issues a request instruction to each of the applications A (432) to C (442) by pressing each “button” with a keyboard or a mouse.

  When the operator selects the contact center A (5) from the contact center state display screen shown in FIG. 8 and presses the “seat button”, the contact center state display unit 451 performs terminal state management via the application control processing unit 450. The control unit 452 is notified of the “seat request” for the application A (432).

  The terminal state management control unit 452 refers to the terminal state management table 453 based on this notification, and determines a control event and a monitoring state for the application 432. Since the detection state in this case is “sitting request”, the control event is determined as “sitting event”, and at the same time, the monitoring state is determined as “incoming”. The determined control event and monitoring state are returned to the application control processing unit 450.

  The application control processing unit 450 sends a “sitting event” to the application 432 according to the returned control event, and monitors whether the application 432 enters the “incoming” state. Thereafter, when an incoming call is transferred from the contact center 5 to the client application 43, the application 432 enters an incoming state.

  The application control processing unit 450 detects that the application 432 has received an incoming call, and notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the detected state as “incoming”. The terminal state management control unit 452 determines a control event and a monitoring state for the application 432 with reference to the terminal state management table 453 based on the notified detection state.

  In this case, since the detection state is “incoming”, the control event determines “pop-up event to the screen” to the application 432, and the monitoring state determines “acceptance end” of the application 432. Next, the terminal state management control unit 452 returns the determined control event and monitoring state to the application control processing unit 450.

  The application control processing unit 450 sends a “pop-up event to the screen” to the application 432 according to the returned control event, and activates the client application A (43) so that the operator can start acceptance. Furthermore, the application control processing unit 450 monitors whether the application 432 enters the “acceptance end (cut button is pressed)” state according to the returned monitoring state.

  Thereafter, when the operator finishes accepting the incoming call and presses the “disconnect button”, the application 432 is in a state where the disconnect button is pressed, and the application control processing unit 450 detects it. Since the detection state is “acceptance end”, the application control processing unit 450 pops up the contact center state display screen (FIG. 8) on the screen of the operator terminal on the contact center state display unit 451, and then accepts it to the operator. Encourage you to select a contact center for

  As described above, the operator confirms the “waiting call” state of the plurality of connected contact centers 5 to 7 on the screen of the client terminal 4, and selects a desired contact center from among them, thereby the client terminal 4. It is possible to respond appropriately to incoming calls at each contact center at the discretion of the user.

(E) Automatic selection of contact center having maximum waiting call In the present invention, the operator presses the “client seating button” while the contact center state display screen (FIG. 8) is displayed. As a result, the contact center state display unit 451 notifies the terminal state management control unit 452 of the “system seating request” to the client terminal 4 via the application control processing unit 450.

  Based on this notification, the terminal state management control unit 452 refers to the “number of waiting calls” of all the applications A to C in the terminal state management table 453, and extracts the application having the maximum number of waiting calls. For example, when the application A (432) is extracted, the “system seating request” is converted into the “sitting request” of the application 432. Thereafter, similarly to the above, the control event and the monitoring state for the application 432 are determined and the incoming call control is performed.

  As described above, the operator can automatically connect to the contact center with the largest number of waiting calls from among a plurality of contact centers by making the client terminal ready to receive a call.

(F) Detour Connection at the Time of Contact Center Failure FIG. 9 shows a case where the customer A makes an inquiry call to the contact center A using the public IP network 1 such as the Internet.
In FIG. 9, when a customer A makes a call to the contact center A, the customer A connects to the normal gateway (GW-1) 53 via the normal line A, and then arrives at the contact center A (5) via the gateway 53. To do.

  However, if the contact center 5 is in an unreceivable state for some reason (in this example, the failure of the normal line A), the call of the customer A is set in the H.450.2 protocol in the public IP network 1 Is transferred to the bypass line A. As a result, the call of the customer A is connected to the gateway (GW-2) 64 at the time of detouring via the detour line A and arrives at the contact center B (6) via the gateway 64.

  In the following description, the block reference code “5xx” of the contact center A (5) in FIG. 2 is changed to the block reference code “6xx” of the contact center B (6). In the contact center 6, the incoming call analysis unit 626 in the call control processing unit 625 that has received an incoming call determines which gateway (GW-2 / GW-3) 64 or 63 is the incoming call. There, it is determined that an incoming call to one gateway (GW-3) 63 is a normal incoming call to the contact center 6, and an incoming call to the other gateway (GW-2) 64 is an incoming call from the contact center A (5). Judge that it has been detoured.

  The incoming call source analysis unit 626 extracts the contact center number of the contact center 5 with reference to the contact center determination table 620 in the latter case. The extracted contact center number is transmitted from the communication control unit 629 to the monitoring terminal 8 and notified to the schedule determination control unit 802 via the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803.

  The schedule determination control unit 802 searches the all operator terminal schedule table 801 using the “contact center number” as a search key, and extracts the “operator number” during the operation time. The schedule determination control unit 802 notifies the extracted operator number to the incoming call source analysis unit 626 via the monitoring terminal communication control unit 803 and the communication control unit 629 of the contact center 6. The incoming call source analysis unit 626 searches the client terminal information table 623 based on the operator number, and extracts the dial number of the client terminal to be received.

  The incoming call source analysis unit 626 that has extracted the dial number makes a “client connection request” to the communication control unit 629. Thereby, the communication control unit 629 makes a call connection request with the extracted dial number. The communication control unit 41 of the client terminal 4 receives a call connection request from the contact center B (6), returns a call connection permission, and establishes a call between the contact center 6 and the client terminal 4.

  When the call is established, the incoming call source analysis unit 626 of the contact center 6 transmits the activation application type to the corresponding application activation control unit 420 of the client terminal 4 via the communication control unit 624. The corresponding application activation control unit 420 determines the application type to be activated by comparing with the corresponding application activation table 421.

  In this example, application A (432) of contact center A (5) is selected. Next, the corresponding application activation control unit 420 makes an application connection request for connecting an incoming call to the client application 432 determined by the communication control unit 41. The communication control unit 420 connects the incoming call to the client application A (43) and starts the service.

  As described above, even when the contact center A (5) is in a state where the incoming call cannot be made, the incoming call of the customer A bypasses the contact center B (6) and is connected to the client terminal 4, and the customer A performs a desired service. It becomes possible to receive.

  As described above, on the client terminal side, work with a plurality of contact centers can be efficiently performed, and the quiet time zone at the client terminal can be reduced. In addition, waiting calls from a plurality of contact centers can be arbitrarily or preferentially selected and accepted on the client terminal side.

  For example, when multiple calls from multiple contact centers arrive at the same operator at the same time, only one call is accepted and other calls are disabled, or calls that cannot be received are forwarded to another client terminal It is also possible to do. Further, it is possible to manage the congestion state of each contact center on the client terminal side and preferentially process a call from the congested contact center.

  In addition, on the remote site side, it is possible to manage multiple contact centers in the site, and when any contact center fails, the call can be diverted to another contact center via an emergency detour device Become.

  FIG. 10 schematically shows another network configuration example of the distributed contact center system according to the present invention. In this example, on the premise of the network configuration according to the present invention described so far, a common specialist is arranged in the network so as to be able to respond appropriately to advanced inquiries from a plurality of contact centers.

  FIG. 10 has the same configuration as that of FIG. 1 described above, except that an alarm monitoring server 9 and a specialist terminal 10 indicated by a double line frame in the figure are newly provided. 11 and 12 show block configuration examples of the remote site 2 and the client terminal 4 in FIG.

  11 and 12 basically have the same configuration as that of FIGS. 2 and 3 described above, and the communication control unit 512 in FIG. 11 and the alarm button control in FIG. A section 456 and a current client information table 457 are newly added. The alarm management server 9 in FIG. 12 and the specialist terminal in FIG. 13 are newly provided. 1 to 3 are denoted by the same reference numerals, and will not be further described.

Here, the schematic operation of the distributed contact center system in this example will be described first.
In FIG. 10, the access call from the customer A is distributed from the contact center 5 to the client terminal 4 (1 in the figure). Since the operator of the client terminal 4 cannot respond to the inquiry from the customer A by himself / herself, the operator presses the “alarm button”, and the alarm information is registered in the alarm monitoring server 9 (2 in the figure).

  The specialist terminal 10 periodically scans the alarm monitoring server 9 to detect the alarm information (3 in the figure). The detected alarm information and related customer information are displayed on the specialist terminal 10. The specialist silently monitors the content of the call between the customer A and the client via the specialist terminal 10, and presses the “interrupt button” as appropriate to interrupt the call between the customer A and the client (4 in the figure). As a result, the state shifts to a three-party call state of the customer A, the client, and the specialist, and the specialist responds to the inquiry from the customer A as an expert.

With the above operation in mind, the operation of each newly added unit will be described below.
In FIG. 11, the communication control unit 52 of the server 51 performs communication control when the specialist terminal 10 acquires the customer information of the customer A from the customer information table 510. The acquired customer information is displayed on the specialist terminal 10. The customer information includes various information such as the past inquiry history of customer A and whether customer A is a claimer.

  In FIG. 12, the alarm button control unit 456 of the client terminal 4 is activated when the operator presses the “alarm button”, acquires information specifying the client from the current client information table 457, and communicates with the communication control unit 41. The notification is sent to the communication control unit 91 of the alarm management server 9.

  The alarm management server 9 receives an alarm from the alarm button control unit 456 of the client terminal 4 and manages the alarm state. The communication control unit 91 communicates with the client terminal 4 and the specialist terminal 10. The alarm state table control unit 92 receives the alarm information from the client terminal 4 and the correspondence information from the specialist terminal 10 and sets them in the alarm state table 93. The alarm state table 93 manages alarm states corresponding to all operators.

  The specialist terminal 10 in FIG. 13 displays the inquiry status, performs silent monitoring of the content of the call between the customer and the client terminal 4, and performs interrupt control (three-party call) for the call. The basic block configuration of the specialist terminal 10 is almost the same as that of the client terminal 4 (see FIG. 12). The communication control unit 1010 performs communication between the alarm management server 9 and the IP-PBX 52 of the contact center 5-7. The client application A (1020) includes a telephone control unit A (1021) and an application A (1022) used for communication with the contact center A (5).

  The telephone control unit 1021 performs telephone control with the contact center 5 in accordance with a request from the application control processing unit 1041. The application 1022 is an application used in the contact center 5. Similarly, the client application C (1030) is used for communication with the contact center C (7).

  The integrated control application 1040 controls the client applications A (1020) to C (1030) in an integrated manner. The application control processing unit 1041 is activated from the alarm monitoring control unit 1044 and activates corresponding client applications 1020 to 1030. Also, it is activated by the interrupt button control unit 1042 and requests an interrupt call for a call between a client and a customer to the corresponding IP-OBX (52, etc.).

  The interrupt button control 1042 is activated when the specialist presses the “interrupt button” to activate the application control processing unit 1041. The current client information table 1043 is a table for managing information on clients that are currently running the specialist terminal 10. The alarm monitoring control unit 1044 is periodically activated from the task manager, and activates the application control processing unit 1041 if the own state is “vacant”. The own state table 1045 is a table for managing the availability / blockage of the specialist terminal.

  Next, the mutual operation | movement between each part is demonstrated in detail using the specific example shown in FIG. FIG. 14 shows an example of an operation sequence until a specialist responds to an inquiry from customer A. 15 to 17 show examples of tables and the like referred to in the process.

  The client terminal 4 in this example has a specialist call button (“alarm button”) common to all the contact centers 5 to 7. The alarm button control unit 456 of FIG. 12 displays this alarm button on the client terminal 4.

  There are many client applications that have a “supervisor call button”. However, this is a contact button dedicated to a contact center, and is mainly used for calling a supervisor who is familiar with product knowledge handled by the company with an alarm from an operator to perform a silent monitor or interrupt call.

  In FIG. 14, the customer A shown in FIG. 10 starts to access the contact center A (5), and the contact center 5 delivers it to a certain client terminal 4 in the network (S01).

  If there is an incoming call from the customer A to the contact center 5 as a previous step, the incoming call source analysis unit 526 in FIG. 11 performs the customer's telephone number, contact center number, incoming client number, client telephone number, and application to be started. To collect. This information is notified to the client terminal 4 shown in FIG. 12, and the application control processing unit 450 of the client terminal 4 activates the client application 43 corresponding to the application number, and this information shown in FIG. 15 is displayed in the current client information table. Set to 457.

  Returning to FIG. 14, the customer A and the operator of the client terminal 4 are in a call due to the incoming call (S01 and 02). Here, since the complaint of the customer A is legal, the operator presses the “alarm button” on the client terminal 4 and asks the specialist for advice (S03).

  In this case, the alarm button control unit 456 in FIG. 12 activates the application control processing unit 450. The application control processing unit 450 obtains information specifying the client terminal 4 (see FIG. 15) from the current client information table 457, and requests to register it in the alarm monitoring server 9 as alarm information (S04).

  The alarm monitoring server 9 receives the alarm information via the communication control unit 91 and activates the alarm state table control unit 92. The alarm state table control unit 92 searches the alarm state table 93 and sets the alarm information with the current time (registration time) held by the OS added to the empty area (S05). FIG. 16 shows an example of alarm information registered in the alarm state table 93. Excluding information such as registration time, it is a copy of the information set in the current client information table 457 of the client terminal 4.

  On the other hand, in the specialist terminal 10 shown in FIG. 13, the alarm monitoring control unit 1044 is periodically activated by the task manager of the OS function. The alarm monitoring control unit 1044 refers to own state data 1045 indicating the state of the own terminal at the time of activation. As shown in FIG. 17, in the own state table 1045, a “vacant” state capable of responding to an inquiry from a customer at the present time or another “blocked” state is set. If your status is “blocked”, do nothing.

  When the own state is set to “free” (S06), the application control processing unit 1041 periodically started from the alarm monitoring control unit 1044 passes through the communication control unit 1010, and the alarm management server shown in FIG. The alarm information registered in the alarm state table control unit 92 is requested (S07). The alarm state table control unit 92 searches the alarm state table 93 and extracts the alarm information with the oldest registration time (see FIG. 16). The extracted information is deleted from the alarm state table 93 to avoid double access.

  In the search and extraction of the alarm information, only alarm information in a specific field such as a law may be extracted. For example, alarm type information may be added to the alarm information in FIG. 15, or alarm type information to be extracted may be included in the alarm request information from the specialist terminal 10.

  The extracted alarm information is passed to the application control processing unit 1041 of the specialist terminal 10 via the communication control units 41 and 1010 (S08). The application control processing unit 1041 of the specialist terminal 10 sets input data in the current client information table 1043. Also, the corresponding client application A (1020) is activated from the input data, and an “interrupt button” is also displayed.

  At that time, the application control processing unit 1041 activates the alarm monitoring control unit 1044 to issue a request for changing its own state (blocking from empty). The alarm monitoring control unit 1044 changes its own state data in its own state table 1045, which is the internal data, from “empty” to “blocked”.

  The application control processing unit 1041 further requests customer information of the customer A from the server 51 (FIG. 11) of the contact center 5 via the communication control unit 1010 based on the contact center number of the input data and the customer's telephone number. (S09). The contact center server 51 searches the customer information database 510 using the telephone number of the customer A as a key, and passes the customer information of the search result to the application control processing unit 1041 of the specialist terminal 10 via the communication control units 529 and 10101 (S10). .

  The application control processing unit 1041 requests the client application A (1020) that has already been activated to display customer information, and displays the received customer information on the application (S11). The displayed customer information includes various information such as the customer A's past access history and whether or not it is a claimer.

  Next, the application control processing unit 1041 receives the contact center number, the customer's telephone number, and the client's telephone number that have been input in advance, and sends them to the IP-PBX 52 of the contact center 5 via the communication control units 1010 and 529. A silent monitor request for the customer's telephone number and the client's telephone number is issued (S12 and 13). The “monitor” setting may be set so that a specialist can manually set the monitor.

  In response to this request, the IP-PBX 52 adds a monitoring call path to the specialist terminal 10 so that the call between the customer A and the client terminal 4 can be monitored (S14). The monitor listens to the call between the customer A and the client terminal 4 on the side of the specialist terminal 10 so as not to be noticed by both, and is called “silent monitor”.

  During the silent monitor, when the specialist presses the “interrupt button” displayed on the screen of the specialist terminal 10 (S15), the interrupt button control unit 1042 of the integrated control application 1040 is activated, and the application control processing unit 1041 A request for “interrupt call (three-way call)” is issued. The application control processing unit 1041 extracts the telephone number of the customer A and the telephone number of the current client from the current client information table 1043, and requests a call interruption from the contact center 5 via the communication control unit 1010 (S16).

  This request is given to the IP-PBX 52 via the communication control unit 529 of the contact center 5, and an interrupt call is requested for the call between them based on the input telephone number of the customer A and the telephone number of the current client. To do. As a result, the IP-PBX 52 sets up a path for an interrupted call, thereby executing an interrupted call to the call between the customer A and the current client (S17).

  The subsequent processing is not shown in FIG. 14, but when the silent monitor or barge call by the specialist ends, the application from the telephone control unit A (1021) of the specialist terminal 10 via the application A (1020) A completion request is issued to the control processing unit 1041.

  The application control processing unit 1041 activates the alarm monitoring control unit 1044 and issues a request for changing its own state (empty from blocking). The alarm monitoring control unit 1044 changes the internal state data of the internal state table 1045 that is the internal data from “blocked” to “empty”.

  As described above, according to this example, when an alarm request is generated from a client terminal corresponding to a plurality of contact centers, the fact is notified to a common specialist corresponding thereto, and the specialist who has received this notification Can be handled by silent monitor and interrupt call.

  Therefore, a specialist common to a plurality of contact centers can be arranged, and the economic burden is greatly reduced as compared to arranging each specialist for each contact center. Furthermore, since it is possible to provide advanced advice by various specialists according to the contents of the inquiry, it is possible to provide a service with high customer satisfaction.

It is the figure which showed typically an example of the network structure of the distributed contact center system by this invention. It is the figure which showed the basic block structural example of the remote site of FIG. It is the figure which showed the basic block structural example of the client terminal of FIG. It is the figure which showed an example of the all operator terminal schedule table. It is the figure which showed an example of the transmission starting schedule table. It is the figure which showed an example of Sign-On schedule data. It is the figure which showed one structural example of the terminal state management table. It is the figure which showed an example of the contact center state display screen. It is the figure which showed an example of the detour connection at the time of contact center failure. It is the figure which showed typically the example of another network structure of a distributed contact center system. It is the figure which showed the basic block structural example of the remote site of FIG. It is the figure which showed the basic block structural example of the client terminal of FIG. 10, and an alarm management server. It is the figure which showed the basic block structural example of the specialist terminal of FIG. FIG. 11 is a sequence diagram illustrating an operation example of FIG. 10. It is the figure which showed an example of the present client information. It is the figure which showed an example of alarm information. It is the figure which showed an example of the self-state information.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 PSTN or public IP network 2 Remote site 3 Private network or public IP network 4 Client terminal 5-7 Contact center 8 Monitoring terminal 9 Alarm monitoring server 10 Specialist terminal 43-44 Client application 45 Integrated control application 51-71 Contact center server 52 ~ 72 IP-PBX
53, 63, 64 gateway

Claims (6)

Multiple contact centers,
A contact center system comprising client terminals connected to the plurality of contact centers,
The client terminal has an application corresponding to the plurality of contact centers and a communication contention control function between them only on the client terminal side, whereby any client terminal can call a call corresponding to the plurality of contact centers. A contact center system characterized by accepting. And a monitoring terminal for managing and controlling the plurality of contact centers,
The said monitoring terminal has a function which implement | achieves a desired service by setting call control schedule information for every said some contact center based on the operation plan of all the operators. Contact center system. The client terminal further manages and displays a waiting call for each of the plurality of contact centers;
A function of arbitrarily selecting a displayed waiting call and accepting a waiting call of a desired contact center, or a function of automatically selecting and accepting a waiting call according to a predetermined condition. The contact center system according to 1.   When the communication contention control means accepts an incoming call from one contact center, the communication contention control means notifies the other contact center that the incoming call cannot be received and stops the incoming call. The contact center system according to claim 1, further comprising a function of waiting for an incoming call again. If a failure occurs in any of the plurality of contact centers, the plurality of contact centers have a function of bypassing another contact center and causing the client terminal to receive an incoming call, and a function of notifying the client terminal that the incoming call is bypassed. And
The contact center system according to claim 1, wherein the client terminal starts a corresponding application of the contact center that is not accepted due to the notification. And a specialist terminal common to the plurality of contact centers;
An alarm management server for managing alarm information from the client terminal,
2. The contact center system according to claim 1, wherein the specialist terminal performs an interruption call to a call between a client terminal indicated by the alarm information acquired from the alarm management server and a contact center.

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