Nordia Inc

Source: Exec Digital USA

Date :9/16/2007 12:05:10 PM

Calling Up Good Service

Call centers are a critical aspect of customer service, and the function is increasingly contracted out to specialists such as Nordia Inc. to get it all right

Written by James Buchanan & Produced Michael Townsend

Though call centers aren’t exactly a new phenomenon, they have become a far more ubiquitous aspect of life in an increasingly hi-tech world.

Further, technological advances have given old-style call centers a modern makeover, adding new utility and increased efficiency benefiting businesses and customers.

As such, call centers have become almost de rigueur. However, for a small to mid size company, establishing its own center is prohibitively expensive and likely not considered part of its core competency.

This is where companies such as Nordia Inc. have found a niche to fill.

“Nordia is a third party outsourcer for call center services that has been in existence since 1999,” says Anita De Laurentis, VP of operations at Montreal-based Nordia.

“Ninety percent of the company’s business deals with telecommunications services for our clients’ customer care, relay services for the hearing impaired, and teleconferencing,” De Laurentis explains. “The remaining 10 percent of services are for technological helpdesk, helpdesk for taxation software, outbound surveys for financial institutions, and telemarketing.”

She goes on to say that the company has five call centers handling approximately 100 million customer contacts per year, which and are located throughout Quebec and Ontario.

Pierre Grimard, VP of IT, adds that the company is on the brink of bringing a new call center online in the Philippines, which would be its first overseas call center.

“The call centers are run by directors that have a relative degree of autonomy, while some functions are managed centrally,” she says. “This is particularly important because some services are shared between call centers in order to mitigate language issues [French/English] or call volumes for a particular account.”

De Laurentis also notes that the company’s clients prefer to have dedicated call center agents handling calls for their accounts. In some cases, the complexity of the account calls for highly technically skilled agents or proficiency in sales or typing abilities for services such as call relay for the hearing impaired.

Further, the intent of this third party provider is to make its call centers a seamless extension of its client’s companies. In this sense, the call center agents’ ability to manage brand identity and promotion are critically important to Nordia and its clients.

Agents must also be able to work within a multimedia environment that includes phone, email, chat, web and fax.

Currently, Nordia employs 2,100 people, of which approximately 240 perform administrative services, while the rest are frontline agents working within the call centers.

De Laurentis says that the largest of the centers have between 250 and 260 seats, which can be continuously staffed by more than 300 employees.

Grimard adds that the Philippine call center is expected to grow to 1,600 seats with round the clock operability.

Further, due to the varied nature of Nordia’s work, the term of client contracts are dependent on the type of services being provided.

“Most of our contracts are long-term contracts, but surveys and telemarketing contracts could have a duration of anywhere from three to six months,” says De Laurentis. “Also, some of our work is seasonally based, such as taxation support, which will run from January through April. But most of our contracts run for five years.”

She goes on to add, “We have really distinguished ourselves with our expertise in technology and the advances we have made with our call centers.”

In general, says Grimard, “In terms of uniqueness, we have a proactive and innovative approach to technology and we bring this to our clients.”

In particular, he adds, beginning in 2005 the company converted all of its call centers to Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology from Bell Canada called IP-VPN (Virtual Private Network). The system within which the company placed this technology and its application have earned Nordia a number of industry awards.

According to Grimard, the impetus for the switch was the need to respond to increasing call volumes — which were reaching nearly 50,000 calls per day — with an efficient and financially viable system.

The use of VoIP technology allowed the company to scale up its call volume without having to open another call center, which represented a savings of time (for deployment) and money for the company. Purchasing a new building then equipping and staffing it would have involved considerable expense.

VoIP also allowed the company to essentially turn its five call centers into one virtual center because calls can be seamlessly routed between them – whether the center is in Montreal, Sherbrooke or the Philippines. This level of seamless interconnectivity also enables the company to provide its clients with inshore and offshore options as to how it wants its calls handled.

Further, VoIP technology has been a cost savings for Nordia and its customers, by reducing long distance call charges by approximately $500,000 per year.

The system — which is Internet protocol (IP) based — also enables the company to save on hardware and servers because they can be centrally managed and located, rather than having the need for an entire system installed in each center.

Nordia has also led the way in its relay service for the deaf and hearing impaired. In a traditional relay scenario, calls are made by a person that is deaf or hearing impaired using a teletypewriter (TTY), which is connected to a standard phone line.

When using Nordia’s service, clients connect to a Communications Assistant (CA) that assists with connecting the call. Once connected, the deaf or hearing impaired person types in what they wish to say, which is read to the person on the other line. Responses are transcribed and relayed by the CA so they can be read by the deaf or hard of hearing person.

Nordia has taken this service a step further by developing its own Internet-based relay protocol (IP relay) that enables relay calls to be made online with a high degree of service reliability and additional features that can be tailored to each user.

What makes this service attractive to those with hearing impairments is that they can make text-based phone calls from their home computers, as well as wireless handheld devices such as a Blackberry or some other personal digital assistant (PDA).

Within this format, a call is placed on a computer or handheld device and is connected to a Nordia call center CA. The CA calls the voice number and relays the communications between the two speakers.

“What we are able to do,” says Grimard, “is integrate TTY and VoIP technologies — which was a challenge — and makes us unique among other companies offering relay services. Also, with our center in the Philippines we can provide an offshore option, which will help bring the cost of service down.”

In a business where having a good demeanor on the phone is critical; Nordia seeks to distinguish itself with how it manages its employees.

Approximately two years ago the company implemented what De Laurentis calls an Open Book Culture, where the company’s financial and other information is available to all employees.

“This allows them to participate in the decision-making process to a certain degree, as they feel they have a stake in the company,” says De Laurentis. “They can see how the company is meeting its goals, and can share in making improvements.”

In tandem with the Open Book Policy, Nordia has also begun to tie the economic performance of the company to employee performance in a meaningful way.

Essentially, the corporate incentive program requires that targets be met as outlined by client needs, such as sales performance or call handling time. The program is designed to ensure the quality of service provided and to seek ways to improve how services are delivered — thereby positively impacting the bottom line. Further, this program does not exempt management as metrics are set for their performance as well.

“This program has allowed us to improve on our profitability and to target our efficiency initiatives,” she says.

Combined, these two programs help ensure that the company’s employees have a high level of participation within Nordia’s operations and continuous improvement, De Laurentis adds. Attrition rates have declined as a result of this approach.

Looking to the future, de Laurentis says that due to its success — one client saw its end-customer satisfaction increase 20 percent in three months — the company is being solicited by its current clients looking to purchase more services from Nordia. Therefore, she says significant growth will likely occur organically.

Pursuing organic growth also means the company will seek to grow its call center capacity, which could mean opening at least one additional call center, probably in 2008, she says.

Nordia may also look to expand beyond its telecommunications call center offering to include insurance companies and financial institutions.

Grimard adds that the company’s offshore efforts will likely expand as well.

“We now have two companies that are being served by our Philippines center, mostly for English language calls, but we want to expand to English and French,” he says. “Offering an offshore and inshore option to our clients will give us a competitive edge.”