Distributed Contact Center

Distributed Contact Center
A retail organization with outlets across the country maintains a call center with 200 agents, primarily for inbound customer service. To remain competitive, this retailer must provide extended hours of service, with a "follow-the-sun" approach, by having two call centers, one located on the Pacific and the other on the Atlantic coast. Both call centers have overlapping hours of coverage to assist during the peak call load periods during the day. The centers are supported by two networked digital PBXs with ACD and customized CTI.

In addition to supporting regular inbound calls, the retailer is looking to implement a converged IP contact center, which integrates the functionality of the call center with their Web site. Web site users are to have seamless integration when working with the site and the new contact center.

To build this capability, IP telephony technology has been defined for use. The organization has the choice of purchasing IP-PBX systems or using an IP-Centrex service from a national provider. With the IP-PBX option, the retailer will run VoIP traffic over the corporate WAN between the sites (a 3-Mbps LAN extension circuit derived from a carrier-provided MPLS network). With IP-Centrex, the carrier will be responsible for connecting the traffic between the two sites (resulting in a broadband interconnect charge).

In the estimates for IP-Centrex, we have included a figure of $80 per month for each agent, for the rental of contact center-related software (ie., ACD and CRM). Because this results in a 5-year total of $870,000, compared with an estimated $500,000 purchase cost for two copies of the software on the IP-PBXs, it is probably a higher figure than can be justified.

We should also note that the expected annual cost for the system administration/software support personnel has been set at $70,000 each, to account for the high skill level required in this complex contact center environment.

The bottom line totals show a 10% lifetime cost advantage to the IP-Centrex solution, compared with two IP-PBXs.