As jolly as the festive season is perceived on our TV screens, the harsh reality is that this is generally not the case.
Quick, simple and convenient shopping with no frustrations is now the modern consumer expectation.
As a retail merchant, you can spend a lot of time planning for the Christmas rush of November and December. Company targets expect a better performance than the year before, with an increase in sales and more customers. But are your teams, payment services and systems up to the challenge? Santa’s workshop is nothing in comparison to a busy contact center at Christmas!
By assessing your shopping channels and the tools your teams will use, you can determine the obstacles preventing you in delivering an optimized customer experience. Don’t let your current processes drive customers to a competitor instead.
Make Things Easier for Your Team on the Phone
When taking payments over the phone, do you really know how many steps are involved? Do staff need to log into a different system, write card details down or ask the customer to wait as they stop the call recording? This all takes up valuable time, and can be open to mistakes.
For any temporary Christmas staff, using unfamiliar systems and engaging with impatient callers can be a daunting experience. How much time do you really have to train new members of the team, keeping an eye on their call quality and troubleshooting issues?
With a secure payment facility embedded into your contact center system, the process is smooth and very easy to use. No separate logins, no need to secure the call, and most importantly – your customers don’t need to read sensitive card details out loud to a stranger over the phone. You’ve just supercharged the level of payment security for your organization.
Keep Recording Your Calls and Reduce Human Error
For call recording, some over-the-phone payment systems require staff to manually pause the recording as customers read out their card details. Sometimes staff can forget to do this, immediately leaving an audio file in your network containing very sensitive payment details. Using the telephone keypad to enter card details isn’t fool proof either. Each keypress gives out a unique tone (known as DTMF tones), which can be deciphered by those who are clever and determined enough.
The solution? Take any sensitive audio out the equation completely. No spoken numbers and no keypad presses. Using technology called DTMF suppression allows you to record the entire call from start to finish, including every step of the payment process. No need to pause and resume and no need to worry about recording sensitive details. Less pressure for you and your agents!
Fighting Back Against Fraud
Last but certainly not least… protect your customers and your organization. The last thing your customers want during the Christmas period, is to deal with the bank’s fraud department, disputing transactions and waiting for new cards to come through the post.
If you did experience a data-breach from cyber criminals, you can be assured that your customers payment details are safe – they’re not even there to steal!
Details are processed securely there-and-then when the agent is talking to the customer, without being stored on your network. I can assure you, your IT team will thank you for that.
Plan for the Christmas Rush
Be prepared for the Christmas rush with a secure and reliable payment service. Talk to my team about your contact center challenges and if our Agent Assisted Payment solution is right for you. Call +1 (929) 230 1185 or email us at sales@keyivr.co.uk
Written by:
Darren Wooding
Managing Director & CTO (UK) & CEO (US)
