18 technology Making customer contact count
Barely a day goes by when we don‘t interact with a contact centre in one way or another. We might be phoning a company to see if a product is available online, having a live chat with an individual about holiday options, or waiting in a queue to query a bill which has just arrived
Increased use of technology has merited many a column inch both for and against, yet for Reading-based IP Integration (IPI), which provides a range of contact centre solutions, excellence in customer service is always the ultimate goal.
The company, founded in 2001 by CEO Joe Prentis, works with many familiar names, including The Co-operative, NHS Professionals, Dixons, Autoglass and Ladbrokes, and IPI expects turnover for the year just ended (September) to be around £14 million.
In 2012, the decision was taken to play to IPI‘s strengths and to focus on solutions for the contact centre market, with the goal of achieving a 5% share of the UK contact centre market within five years, with a turnover of £30m.
Barclays has been providing ongoing banking support since early 2012 and, in the latest Southern Tech 100 league table sponsored by Barclays to showcase the region‘s top technology businesses, IPI featured at number 70*.
“IPI sees there being five building blocks in the pyramid of propositions, starting with network connectivity, followed by infrastructure, voice infrastructure, business applications and consultancy at the top,“ said Prentis.
“It is our strategic approach and the fact we focus on the top two of the pyramid – business applications and consultancy – enabling our customers to get more from their contact centre investments, which has made us so successful.“
Prentis says its ability to provide consultancy expertise and customer-focused applications, plus the skills of the in-house software development team, enable the business to differentiate itself from its competitors.
“The consultancy arm is especially beneficial to our customers as we don‘t always approach problems from a technology standpoint,“ continued Prentis. “That‘s because we employ people who come from a call centre and customer service
The goal now is to incorporate the Acenseo solutions within the already established IPI portfolio of products that address PCI (payment card industry) system compliance issues within the contact centre. Today, IPI‘s solutions protect over 100,000 transactions a day worth 10s of millions of pounds for some of the leading brands in the UK.
Prentis is also very excited by a new PCI security solution which his software team has recently developed.
“We‘re currently going through the patent stage, but we have come up with a solution which we believe is the best out there in the market globally,“ he said. “This could be a game changing product for the company and open doors for us that would otherwise be closed.“
He says the challenge for IPI now will be how to go to market with this opportunity. To this end he is currently considering the best way to incubate a “business within a business“ in order to take advantage of the huge potential he sees for the new product.
Joe Prentis
background, and therefore we understand the operational issues, such as how to reduce agent churn or call centre handling times. This means we can maximise potential and provide relevant and strategic advice.“
While he advocates a holistic approach to customer service, helping many companies to adopt a new omni-channel approach, interacting with customers through email, social media or live chat, he says it‘s important not to forget that many people still want to talk – especially when they are experiencing problems or wish to complain – rather than being kept at “arm‘s length“.
Prentis describes data security as another “very hot topic“ in the contact centre world, especially given the recent well-documented leaks suffered by a number of high-profile companies, and says one of the biggest challenges is the difficulty of protecting customer data, whether it is held locally on site or hosted in the cloud.
One of the key aims of the business is to help organisations make their contact centres more secure and, to assist this goal, the company recently acquired IT security services provider Acenseo, which Prentis views as having a strong pedigree in delivering tailored secure access solutions, including an award-winning cloud- based two-factor authentication solution, based on industry-leading technology from VASCO.
Barclays is a trading name of Barclays Bank PLC and its subsidiaries. Barclays Bank PLC is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority (Financial Services Register No 122702). Registered in England. Registered number is 1026167 with registered office at 1 Churchill Place, London E14 5HP. October 2015.
www.businessmag.co.uk
At present, the business is largely UK-centric, but Prentis also has international expansion on the horizon.
Clearly, customer communication is king – whichever channel you use.
Details:
Joe Prentis
Ipi.info@
ipintegration.com 0118-9184600
www.ipintegration.com
Andrew Sharman
andrew.sharman@
barclays.com 07867-352873
www.barclays.com
*Southern Tech Top 100 league table as compiled by The Business Magazine
The views expressed in this article are the views of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Barclays Bank PLC Group nor should they be taken as statements of policy or intent of the Barclays Bank PLC Group. The Barclays Bank PLC Group takes no responsibility for the veracity of information contained in the third party guides or articles and no warranties or undertakings of any kind, whether express or implied, regarding the accuracy or completeness of the information given. The Barclays Bank PLC Group takes no liability for the impact of any decisions made based on information contained and views expressed.
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – SOLENT & SOUTH CENTRAL – OCTOBER 2015
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