Smart thinking, smoother onboarding of new customers at Lowell

Let's talk about the idea for using QR technology to drive down call volumes 

The landing page proof-of-concept?

Yes, that’s the one. What’s the thinking behind it?

We noticed that whenever we onboarded a new client or portfolio, customers would flood us with calls asking basic questions about their account. Our front-line agents were having the same low-level conversation repeatedly. ‘What’s this account for?’. ‘How much interest is on the account?’. That kind of thing.

That’s not just mind-numbing for the agents, it also drives up AHT (average handling time), frustrates customers, and encourages complaints. We knew there must be a smarter way to handle it.

So where does the QR code fit?

We figured that by giving customers access to some of the same information that’s available to our agents, they could self-serve online. The way we get the customer to the information is through a QR code on the NOA (Notice of Assignment) that we send them. That’s the first time the customer hears about us. The QR code takes them directly to a bespoke landing page specific to their account.

Cool. And what do they find on the landing page that they couldn’t see before?

We’ll answer the questions that they normally call in to ask. Things like ‘What’s the item or service that’s run up my debt?’, ‘How much is my airtime bill?’, ‘Are there any termination fees?’. It also depends on the richness of data we get from the client and the type of debt.

It sounds straightforward. But there’s probably more to it than meets the eye…

Indeed. The most significant challenges are around data. We conducted a comprehensive review of clients across all portfolios, especially those on Forward Flow agreements. By analysing account data, we found the ideal clients to target for the PoC - those with high-quality data that give customers a clear understanding of their debt.

We had to integrate data from Caseflow – our CRM system – into the customer portal’s account summary screen, which also involved redesigning the screen and reviewing the UX/UI.

Away from the technical side of the project, we put a great deal of effort into securing branding approvals with our client, which is an essential part of building customer trust.

Sounds like a hard slog. What proved particularly tricky?

We ran into design challenges to make sure the page worked in both mobile and desktop formats but, you know, that’s what web design is all about. A trickier task was ensuring that we populated the account summary page with accurate data. Client data isn’t uniform, so we had to devise client-specific solutions for non-standard data fields.

You said this was a proof-of-concept. Would you say you’ve proved it?

Absolutely.

We’ve seen a 48-second reduction in Average Handling Time for the client’s customers, and a 68% positive action rate among customers visiting the landing page. So we’ve seen both efficiency savings in our contact centre operation and increased engagement from customers.

We’re now expanding the project to three more clients, testing how we handle different data points. And if that’s successful, we’ll be pushing the concept across all new clients.