JP4702111B2 - Call center system and incoming call response method thereof - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a call center system and a method for answering an incoming call so as not to wastefully charge a call fee generated when a customer on an outside line makes a call with an operator.

  2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, call center systems often respond to incoming calls primarily by using IVR (Interactive Voice Response), play back pre-recorded voice guidance, and interactively respond mechanically. In other words, when there is an incoming call in the call center system, the operator often responds with IVR regardless of whether or not the operator can make a call.

  In general, during a primary response with IVR, after searching for a notification destination operator with an ACD (Auto Call Distribution: automatic call distribution) function, an incoming notification is equally distributed to the corresponding operator terminals. The incoming notification is evenly distributed to the extension terminals handled by the operator. By using IVR or ACD, it is possible to effectively reduce the operation of the operator.

  As such, “within a predetermined capacity range, one or a plurality of internal terminal devices are provided to accommodate incoming calls from one or a plurality of external terminal devices, the call center is accommodated, and the external terminals When an incoming call is received from the device to the call center, it is checked whether or not the response to the call is performed within the range of the corresponding capacity of the call center. When connected to the terminal device and not performed within the range, external exchange means connected to the overflow call response means, and when receiving the connection, by executing a predetermined pseudo-response to the external terminal device, And a call center communication system having a private branch exchange means that has been proposed (for example, patents). Document reference 1).

JP 2002-281158 A

  In the call center communication system described in Patent Document 1, the ACD unit acquires operator information and customer information, creates an operator list indicating the priority of operators based on the information, and notifies the IVR unit of the operator list. Is preferentially transmitted to the operator with higher priority based on the priority of the operator list. In this way, the telephone response is smoothly progressed, and the efficiency and success of the call center business are positively affected.

  However, in such a conventional system, even if there is no connection with the operator due to the absence of an operator or a timeout of the call, the primary response is started by the IVR when there is an incoming call from the customer. There was a problem that the customer of the connected outside line was charged. In other words, when a call from a customer is answered, a call charge is generated, and the call charge according to the time is charged to the customer who makes a call from the outside line.

  In addition, after detecting an incoming call from a customer, a method of preventing unnecessary billing for the customer by not answering with IVR immediately can be considered. However, such a method causes a problem that guidance cannot be reproduced for an outside line customer. That is, there arises a problem that the IVR provided for effectively reducing the operation of the operator does not make sense.

  The present invention has been made to solve the above-described problems, and determines whether or not to answer an incoming call from a customer, and a call center system that prevents a customer from being charged unnecessarily. An incoming call answering method is provided.

The call center system according to the present invention includes an ACD processing means for automatically distributing an incoming call notification to an operator terminal device when an incoming call from an external telephone device is detected, and a response process for determining whether or not to make a primary response to the incoming call. A telephony server provided with a means, an incoming call waiting time history that records the time from when an incoming call is detected until a call is made with the operator, and an incoming call that records the number of all detected incoming calls The detection counter, the guidance playback time for recording the time required to reproduce the voice guidance, and the time recorded in the incoming call waiting time history are totaled, and the total waiting time is recorded in the incoming call detection counter. The database stores the average incoming call waiting time that records the average waiting time calculated by dividing by the number of current incoming calls. A call center system having a call center server configured by the server, the response processing means, for incoming calls the operator does not respond, the latency of the incoming call, recorded in the incoming call average latency If it is shorter than the time calculated by subtracting the time required to reproduce the voice guidance recorded at the guidance reproduction time from the average waiting time, the primary call is not answered to the incoming call. If it is longer than the calculated time, it is determined to make a primary response to the incoming call, and voice guidance is reproduced when the primary response is made to the incoming call. And

The call center answering method of the call center system according to the present invention, when detecting an incoming call from an external line telephone device, automatically distributes the incoming call notification to the operator terminal device, and determines whether or not to make a primary response to the incoming call. An incoming call response method for a call center system, wherein when an incoming call is detected, a detection time of the incoming call is initialized, and a time from when the incoming call is detected to when a call state is established with an operator is determined The average waiting time calculated by summing the waiting time of all incoming calls detected as incoming call waiting time and dividing the total waiting time by the number of current incoming calls recorded, and voice guidance The time it takes to play the call, measure the waiting time of the incoming call from the detected detection time to the present, and determine whether the operator is answering For an incoming call that is determined not to be answered by the operator, the waiting time of the incoming call required from the detection time to the present time is subtracted from the average waiting time by the time required to reproduce the voice guidance. If shorter than the calculated time is determined not to primary response to said incoming call, if longer than the time issued the calculated is discriminated to respond primary to said incoming call The voice guidance is reproduced when a primary response is made to the incoming call .

The call center system according to the present invention includes an ACD processing means for automatically distributing an incoming call notification to an operator terminal device when an incoming call from an external telephone device is detected, and a response process for determining whether or not to make a primary response to the incoming call. A telephony server provided with a means, an incoming call waiting time history that records the time from when an incoming call is detected until a call is made with the operator, and an incoming call that records the number of all detected incoming calls The detection counter, the guidance playback time for recording the time required to reproduce the voice guidance, and the time recorded in the incoming call waiting time history are totaled, and the total waiting time is recorded in the incoming call detection counter. The database stores the average incoming call waiting time that records the average waiting time calculated by dividing by the number of current incoming calls. A call center system having a call center server configured with a server, wherein the response processing means records the waiting time of the incoming call in the incoming call average waiting time for an incoming call not answered by an operator. If it is shorter than the time calculated by subtracting the time required to reproduce the voice guidance recorded at the guidance reproduction time from the average waiting time, the primary call is not answered to the incoming call. If it is longer than the calculated time, it is determined to make a primary response to the incoming call, and the voice guidance is played when the primary response is made to the incoming call. It is possible to prevent unnecessary charging.

The call center answering method of the call center system according to the present invention, when detecting an incoming call from an external line telephone device, automatically distributes the incoming call notification to the operator terminal device, and determines whether or not to make a primary response to the incoming call. An incoming call response method for a call center system, wherein when an incoming call is detected, a detection time of the incoming call is initialized, and a time from when the incoming call is detected to when a call state is established with an operator is determined The average waiting time calculated by summing the waiting time of all incoming calls detected as incoming call waiting time and dividing the total waiting time by the number of current incoming calls recorded, and voice guidance The time it takes to play the call, measure the waiting time of the incoming call from the detected detection time to the present, and determine whether the operator is answering For incoming calls the operator determines that no response latency of the incoming call taken to date from the detection time, by subtracting the time required from the average waiting time for playing the voice guidance If shorter than the calculated time is determined not to primary response to said incoming call, if longer than the time issued the calculated is discriminated to respond primary to said incoming call Since the voice guidance is reproduced when the primary response is made to the incoming call, it is possible to prevent unnecessary billing for the customer.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram showing a configuration of a call center system 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention. The call center system 100 is a system that integrates telephone functions and computer functions and performs various telephone-related services such as product order processing and inquiries. The call center system 100 is connected to an external line terminal 201 and an external line PC (Personal Computer) terminal 301 via a public network 200 and an IP (Internet protocol) network 300.

  A customer who wants to receive the service provided by the call center system 100 makes an inquiry to the call center system 100 from the external line terminal 201 or the PC connection telephone device 302 (external line telephone device) connected to the external line PC terminal 201. It has become. The external line terminal 201 is a fixed telephone device installed at home, a public telephone device installed on the street, or the like. Further, although not shown, the call center system 100 may be inquired by a mobile phone device.

  The call center system 100 includes a call center server 10 that provides a call center function, and a call center operator 60 that responds to inquiries from customers. The call center server 10 includes a telephony server 20 and a database server 30. Further, the call center operator 60 is provided with two operator terminals 61 and an extension terminal 63. It is assumed that the PC connection telephone device 61 is connected to the operator terminal 61.

  The call center server 10 is provided with an extension hub 40, and an extension terminal 63 provided in the call center operator 60, the telephony server 20, the database server 30, and the extension network 41 provided by the extension hub 40. Is supposed to be connected. Further, the call center server 10 is provided with a router 50, and the IP network 300 and the call center system 100 are relayed by the router 50. The telephony server 20, the database server 30, and the operator terminal 61 provided in the call center operator 60 are connected to the router 40 via a LAN (Local Area Network) 51.

  The telephony server 20 is generally referred to as a CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) server. The telephony server 20 is connected to the external line terminal 201 via the public network 200 and functions to detect an incoming call from the external line terminal 201. Further, the telephony server 20 is connected to the PC connection telephone device 302 via the LAN 51 and the IP network 300, and has a function of detecting an incoming call from the PC connection telephone device 302. The telephony server 20 includes an ACD processing unit 21, a response processing unit 22, and a data update processing unit 23.

  The ACD processing means 21 functions to perform ACD processing after detecting an incoming call from the public network 200 or the IP network 300. The ACD process is a process for distributing incoming notifications equally to the corresponding operator terminals 61 after the search for connectable operator terminals 61 and also equally distributing the incoming notifications to the extension terminals 63 in charge of the operators. That is. The response processing means 22 functions to determine whether or not to respond to an incoming call when there is an incoming call from the public network 200 or the IP network 300 (described in detail in FIG. 2). The data update processing unit 23 has a function of performing update processing of various data stored in the database server 30.

  The database server 30 stores incoming call waiting time history 31, incoming call detection counter 32, guidance reproduction time 33, and incoming call average waiting time 34 as data. The incoming call waiting time history 31 is a record of the time from when an incoming call is received from each customer until a call is made with the operator. The incoming call detection counter 32 records the number of incoming calls detected by the call center system 100 from the public network 200 and the IP network 300.

  Guidance playback time 33 is a record of the time required for voice guidance to be played before a call is made with the operator. The incoming call average waiting time 34 is the sum of waiting times of all incoming calls detected by the call center system 100 (time recorded in the incoming call waiting time history 31), and the total waiting time is stored in the incoming call detection counter 32. It shows the average waiting time calculated by dividing by the number of current incoming calls recorded.

  The operator terminal 61 constituting the call center operator 60 is capable of executing call control such as incoming / outgoing calls to / from an outside line / outgoing terminal operation. The extension terminal 63 is connected to the telephony server 20 and the database server 30 of the call center server 10 via the extension network 41, and performs a voice call of a call for which call control is performed by the operator terminal 61. The PC connection telephone device 62 is connected to the operator terminal 61 and performs a voice call of a call for which the operator terminal 61 performs call control.

  FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing a processing flow of the call center system 100. Based on FIG. 2, the process flow of the incoming call response method performed by the call center system 100 will be described. In the incoming call response method according to this embodiment, a primary response is not made if there is an incoming call from a customer. First, the incoming call response method starts when the telephony server 20 of the call center system 100 detects that an incoming call is received from a customer via the public network 200 or the IP network 300.

  When the telephony server 20 detects an incoming call from a customer via the public network 200 or the IP network 300, the incoming call detection time is initialized in order to measure the waiting time of the incoming call (step S101). That is, the telephony server 20 initializes the detection time by setting the time when the incoming call is detected as an initial value. The waiting time of the incoming call is an elapsed time required until the present time after the incoming call from each customer is detected.

  Next, the telephony server 20 performs ACD processing by the ACD processing means 21 (step S102). The ACD processing is started when the telephony server 20 calls (searches) an operator connected (logged on) to the call center system 100. During this time, the call (connection) with the customer has not been established yet. That is, no primary response is made. At that time, the telephony server 20 connects to the database server 30 and acquires the average waiting time and the guidance reproduction time (step S103).

  The telephony server 20 is connected to the average waiting time 34 and the guidance reproduction time 33 of the database server 30, and extracts and acquires the average waiting time and the guidance reproduction time recorded in them. Then, the telephony server 20 measures the waiting time of the incoming call required so far (step S104). When the measurement of the incoming call waiting time is completed, the telephony server 20 checks whether or not the operator who has received the call by the ACD process is responding (step S105).

  If the operator is responding (step S105; Yes), the incoming call is answered (step S107). This is the first time that a customer call is established. Therefore, there has been no charge to the customer due to useless call charges. When the telephony server 20 responds to the incoming call, the voice guidance is reproduced for the incoming call (step S108). Although not shown, the voice guidance is reproduced based on the IVR process. And each data of the database server 30 is updated by the data update process means 23 of the telephony server 20 (step S109). Thus, the process of the incoming call response method when the operator answers is completed.

  On the other hand, when the operator does not respond to the call (step S105; No), the telephony server 20 determines whether or not to respond to the incoming call (step S106). The average waiting time acquired from the database server 30 by the telephony server 20 is the average waiting time of the incoming call detected by the call center system 100. In other words, it corresponds to the average response time for the call of the ACD processing by the operator. It is also what you do.

  Therefore, the telephony server 20 determines whether or not to answer the incoming call by comparing the waiting time of the target incoming call with the time calculated by subtracting the guidance playback time from the average waiting time. It is trying to do. That is, for an incoming call that is not answered by the operator, the waiting time of the incoming call is determined by whether it is longer or shorter than the time calculated by subtracting the guidance playback time from the average waiting time. Yes. In this way, since a predetermined standard (average waiting time−guidance reproduction time) is determined, it is possible to determine whether or not to respond to all incoming calls based on a uniform standard.

  When the waiting time of the incoming call is shorter than the time calculated by subtracting the guidance reproduction time from the average waiting time (step S106; No), the telephony server 20 does not answer the incoming call. Determine. The telephony server 20 continues to measure the waiting time of the incoming call until the operator called by the ACD process responds (step S104), and repeats the above steps.

  When the waiting time of the incoming call is equal to or longer than the time calculated by subtracting the guidance playback time from the average waiting time (step S106; Yes), the telephony server 20 It is determined to answer, and the incoming call is answered (step S107). Thus, a call with a customer is established only after answering an incoming call. Therefore, there has been no charge to the customer due to useless call charges.

  When responding to the incoming call, the telephony server 20 reproduces the voice guidance for the incoming call (step S108). And each data of the database server 30 is updated by the data update process means 23 of the telephony server 20 (step S109). The update process of the database server 30 will be described in detail with reference to FIG. In this way, the process of the incoming call response method when the operator does not answer ends. Even if the operator does not answer, if the waiting time of an incoming call becomes longer than a predetermined length, the operator answers the incoming call and plays an appropriate voice guidance to the customer. .

  FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a flow of update processing of the database server 30. Based on FIG. 3, the update process of each data stored in the database server 30 will be described in detail. The update processing of the database server 30 is performed every time a response is made to an incoming call. When the data update process starts, the telephony server 20 records the incoming call waiting time measured by the telephony server 20 in the incoming call waiting time history 31 of the database server 30 (step S201).

  Next, the telephony server 20 acquires an incoming call detection counter from the incoming call detection counter 32 of the database server 30 (step S202). The telephony server 20 uses the average call waiting time obtained from the incoming call detection counter and the average call waiting time 34 of the database server 30 after the start of the ACD processing, and a new average waiting time using the measured incoming call waiting time. Time is calculated (step S203).

  When the calculation of the average waiting time is completed, the telephony server 20 updates the average waiting time data by re-registering the average waiting time in the average waiting time 34 of the database server 30 (step S204). Also, the incoming call detection counter 32 updates the incoming call detection counter data by registering again with the incoming call detection counter acquired from the database server 30 incremented (step S205). When the above steps are completed, the update process of each data in the database server 30 is completed.

  In the embodiment, the case where there are two operator terminals 61 provided in the call center operator 60 is shown as an example, but the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the call center operator 60 may include three or more operator terminals 61. In the embodiment, the case where there is an inquiry from the public network 200 or the IP network has been described as an example, but the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the call center system 100 may be inquired via wireless communication such as a mobile terminal or a mobile phone device.

1 is a system configuration diagram showing a configuration of a call center system. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of a process of a call center system. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of the update process of a database server.

Explanation of symbols

10 call center server, 20 telephony server, 21 ACD processing means, 22 response processing means, 23 data update processing means, 30 database server, 31 incoming call waiting time history, 32 incoming call detection counter, 33 guidance reproduction time, 34 incoming call Average waiting time, 40 extension hub, 41 extension network, 50 router, 51 LAN, 60 call center operator, 61 operator terminal, 62 PC connection telephone equipment, 63 extension terminal, 100 call center system, 200 public network, 201 outside line terminal, 300 IP Network, 301 External PC terminal, 302 PC connection telephone equipment.

Claims (4)

A telephony server comprising: an ACD processing means for automatically distributing an incoming call notification to an operator terminal device when an incoming call from an external telephone device is detected; and a response processing means for determining whether or not to make a primary response to the incoming call; ,
Receiving call waiting time history that records the time from when an incoming call is detected until the operator enters a call state as a history, incoming call detection counter that records the number of all detected incoming calls, and voice guidance playback The total time of the guidance playback time for recording the time required for recording and the time recorded in the incoming call waiting time history is the number of current incoming calls recorded in the incoming call detection counter. A call center system having a call center server configured with a database server storing an average incoming call waiting time for recording an average waiting time calculated by dividing,
The response processing means includes
For incoming calls that are not answered by the operator,
The waiting time of the incoming call is a time calculated by subtracting the time required to play back the voice guidance recorded in the guidance playback time from the average waiting time recorded in the incoming call average waiting time If it is shorter than the calculated time, it is determined not to make a primary response to the incoming call, and if longer than the calculated time, it is determined to make a primary response to the incoming call. A voice center is played when a primary response is made to a call center system. The telephony server is provided with data update processing means for performing update processing of data recorded in the database server,
The call center system according to claim 1, wherein the data update processing unit updates various data of the database server every time a primary response is made to an incoming call. An incoming call response method for a call center system that automatically distributes an incoming call notification to an operator terminal device when an incoming call from an external telephone device is detected, and determines whether to make a primary response to the incoming call,
When an incoming call is detected, the detection time of the incoming call is initialized, and the time from when the incoming call is detected until the operator enters a call state is measured as the waiting time of the incoming call.
The total waiting time of all incoming calls detected as incoming call waiting time is summed, and the average waiting time calculated by dividing the total waiting time by the number of current incoming calls recorded, and voice guidance is played To get time and
Measure the waiting time of incoming calls from the detection time initialized to the present,
Determine if the operator is responding,
For incoming calls that the operator has determined not to answer,
If the waiting time of the incoming call required from the detection time to the present time is shorter than the time calculated by subtracting the time required to reproduce the voice guidance from the average waiting time, the incoming call If it is longer than the calculated time, it is determined to make a primary response to the incoming call, and voice guidance is given when the primary response is made to the incoming call. An incoming call answering method for a call center system, characterized by reproducing . Every time you answer a primary call
A waiting time for an incoming call that measures the time from when the incoming call is detected until a call is made with the operator; and
The number of said incoming calls;
The incoming call response method for a call center system according to claim 3, wherein the average waiting time is updated.

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