Released on: September 24, 2008, 8:55 am

Press Release Author: Nadine Wilson

Industry: Telecommunications

Press Release Summary: Its official; call centres are our 'top irritant' according
to a poll for BBC Two programme Losing It which was broadcasted on the 23 September.
It found 26% said call centre delays were the most infuriating situation.
Three-quarters of the people surveyed mentioned being kept on hold as a source of
annoyance.

Press Release Body: Its official; call centres are our 'top irritant' according to a
poll for BBC Two programme Losing It which was broadcasted on the 23 September. It
found 26% said call centre delays were the most infuriating situation.
Three-quarters of the people surveyed mentioned being kept on hold as a source of
annoyance.

Some of reasons for people becoming annoyed with call centres are typical: not
knowing how much longer you have to wait for, having to restate account information,
you can't do anything else in the mean time or influence the music you have to
listen to. Just imagine being hold for ages only to have the company blast Blondie's
'Keep Me Hanging on the Telephone' in your ear. It is not surprising then that we
become increasingly more annoyed the longer we are kept on hold.

Richard Farrell, Chief Technical Officer at Netcall said: "Because the average
Briton currently spends hours waiting on-hold every year, it is not surprising that
traditional queue handling - whether music or messaging, is becoming increasingly
unpopular. When you take into consideration that one bad customer service experience
is often all it takes for a caller to switch suppliers, reducing call waiting times
should be regarded as critical for organisations."

Netcall's flagship product QueueBuster gives customers an alternative to queuing.
They simply leave their details and hang up. QueueBuster does the rest, patiently
holding for an available agent and only then automatically calling the customer
back. This means that customer can carry on using their most valuable resource;
their time.

One company that has made a change in the way they deal with their customers is
Interflora. QueueBuster was deployed earlier this year and has already had a huge
impact on the call centre. Jayne Henry, Head of Telesales at Interflora commented;"
as a gift and flower company, we have key selling periods and we wanted to manage
the customer experience at these times while avoiding abandoned calls and ultimately
lost sales."



Web Site: http://www.netcall.com

Contact Details: 10 Harding Way
St Ives
Cambridgeshire
PE27 3WR

01480 495300
01480 496717

nadine.wilson@netcall.com