American Communications Center: The Journey to Genesis

When deciding to upgrade to a new call center software platform, it’s essential to look for software that has innovative features to help you attract new clients, flexibility to meet diverse customer needs, and provides agents with tools to efficiently manage calls. Here’s how one call center successfully handled the upgrade process, with practical tips to make your own transition smoother.

ACC Communications Center Inc. (ACC) offers customized virtual receptionist solutions for all types of businesses, both large and small. Founded in Pennsylvania in 1993, ACC helps national and international companies run more efficiently 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. While many call centers began allowing agents to work remotely in 2020 due to the pandemic, ACC’s virtual receptionists have been working remotely since 2017. ACC prides itself on being 100% US-based, with a 100% remote workforce, offering 100% availability, and providing 100% customized services for each client.

Preparing for the Future

Every call center must be able to meet the needs of current clients while also providing services that attract new clients. As new technologies continue to emerge, keeping up with new software options and using these to offer additional services helps call centers and contact centers provide enhanced features for current clients and attract more clients who need these services.

“When I came to ACC, I was trying to learn how to do the programming and develop the call center the way that I would normally run a call center,” said Crystal O’Hara, ACC Vice President. “I found the programming on the current system very difficult.” She continued, “We were doing an acquisition, and it wasn’t working out as well as I had hoped with trying to implement everything I wanted and learning how to do the programming. I convinced my husband, the owner, who had been using the current system for over 20 years, to switch to Telescan because I had previously worked on it and knew that system. Then, when we started using Telescan, it was instantaneous, and I knew exactly what I was doing.”

Adding New Capabilities

Because today’s contact centers answer for a diverse client base, efficiently handling calls for plumbing companies, HVAC, apartment complexes, funeral homes, doctors, hospitals, dentists, vet clinics, and property management can be challenging. “We also answer for a TV station, and we have a very large national and international insurance company who does all kinds of insurance, including workers’ compensation and auto insurance, so we handle many different types of calls,” stated Crystal.

Always looking for ways to improve and enhance their capabilities, Crystal began comparing the software available from the various vendors while attending trade shows. “Going to ATSI every year and hearing the vendors speak, I’d hear what Amtelco was doing one year, and then the next year, other companies were catching up, so the other companies were behind,” according to Crystal.

“Web Agent has a more modern look, so as you’re hiring younger people, it’s going to be easier for them to catch on because it looks like a web browser.”

Crystal O’Hara, ACC Vice President

Making the Decision to Upgrade

After continuing to see more opportunities to grow their business, ACC decided to upgrade to Amtelco’s Genesis call processing system. “Our decision was based on the fact that we want to move forward with the times and not go backward,” said Crystal. “Seeing demos with other products and companies, the things we liked about Amtelco outweighed the other systems.”

ACC Operations Manager Amber Lawrence continued, “The big thing for us is having those additional capabilities that we don’t currently have, which opens us up to be able to reach out to current clients or potential clients that are looking for something that no one else can do.”

Solutions Built for Remote Workforce Needs

With agents in Pennsylvania, Arizona, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Oklahoma, ACC needed a user-friendly solution to simplify complex calls and keep their agents updated. “Web Agent has a more modern look, so as you’re hiring younger people, it’s going to be easier for them to catch on because it looks like a web browser,” stated Crystal

Tools Designed to Keep Clients Connected

In preparation for upgrading to Genesis, ACC sent a survey to their customers to get their input. According to Amber, “One of the largest complaints clients mentioned was spelling accuracy. So, this is a huge thing because our current system is not set up to catch spelling errors. The Intelligent Series Scripting is going to help immensely.

“The big thing for us is having those additional capabilities that we don’t currently have, which opens us up to be able to reach out to current clients or potential clients that are looking for something that no one else can do.”

Amber Lawrence, ACC Operations Manager

ACC is also looking forward to having clients enter their own on-call schedules, which will save time for the ACC supervisors, improve accuracy for agents with instant access to schedule changes and overrides, helping ensure they always contact the correct personnel.

Providing Insights for Management

ACC plans to implement the secure, cloud-based Active Insights call quality management and message archival platform that includes call logs, statistics, recordings, transcripts, agent call history, script logs, message archival, and custom scoring scripts for automated call scoring.

“We’re looking forward to using Active Insights,” said Crystal. “One of my favorite things from long ago was a voice logger that also did screen capture. That way, I could see what the agents were clicking on. We will have that in our Amtelco system, and the capability to grade calls with Active Insights will be very helpful. It makes it possible for us to use supervisors in other ways in our company because we can have Active Insights tell agents what they did right or wrong.”

Training at Amtelco

While learning a new system may seem like a lot to absorb, Crystal and Amber felt that coming to Amtelco for three days of dedicated hands-on training was a good choice for them. “It was nice to be in person together and learn something new, and then we can go back and figure out the best way to set everything up,” said Crystal. Amber added, “We’ve learned so much – even things we didn’t know we could do. It opens up more possibilities for offering even more services for our clients.

Using Scripting to Simplify Setup

Crystal and Amber plan to build scripts that will streamline call handling for agents. “Currently, we ask a question on the screen and fill out a hypertext link that directs them to the next step,” said Crystal. “Our office account is split into subaccounts based on who they’re asking for because each has different instructions.” She continued, “Now, we can build a script for each person, which simplifies programming, and cuts out a lot of information that we don’t need.”

A Bright Future

While getting everything set up the way they’d like it will take some time, ACC is optimistic about their future. Crystal commented, “Moving forward, we’ll be able to use Teams and Zoom and other online platforms for additional training, and to answer questions. We’re looking forward to getting started, because we know we have more options with Amtelco in the way that the future is going.”