Johannesburg, 23 Mar 2006
MultiChoice, South Africa`s multi-channel pay television platform company, has chosen a telephone call automation system from Intelleca to provide its DStv subscribers with access to an automated problem-solving agent. This agent uses on-screen error codes for error identification to start the problem resolution process.
The system gives callers the ability to speak to the virtual "agent" and tell "him" what the error is. The agent then takes the caller through a step-by-step process to solve the problem.
MultiChoice delivers television entertainment via DStv to over a million subscribers in nearly 50 countries in Africa, as well as adjacent Indian Ocean islands. Its operations include world-class subscriber management services and the management of a digital satellite television platform broadcasting over 50 video and 60 audio channels 24 hours a day.
"MultiChoice`s existing interactive voice response (IVR) platform was limited in the functionality and flexibility we require to service our customers going forward," says Tim Fick, resource and systems manager at MultiChoice.
"We chose to go into the future with the world-leading VoiceGenie VoiceXML Media Gateway and speech recognition software from Nuance (formerly known as ScanSoft), both supplied by Intelleca in South Africa. Over and above this best-of-breed technology, the real value that came from Intelleca is in the company`s understanding of how to craft an intelligent self-service system that has a particular persona designed to achieve the task at hand and extend the MultiChoice brand values."
The VoiceGenie platform is designed for large organisations and service providers to improve customer satisfaction through voice-enabled automated self-service.
Nuance technology enables the use of speech to deliver hands-free interaction with applications, services and devices.
Full lifecycle development
Intelleca deployed the IVR solution and integrated it with MultiChoice`s existing Aspect environment. As part of the solution, Intelleca deployed its standards-based VoiceXML integration layer which allows for full call control between the Aspect switch and the VoiceGenie gateway. As with all its projects, Intelleca took MultiChoice through a full speech application lifecycle development.
During the project lifecycle, MultiChoice experienced an unexpected decoder upgrade which would have resulted in the call centre being overloaded, and would have consequently had a serious impact on service levels.
"MultiChoice contacted Intelleca at 9.30am on a Wednesday morning with a request to develop, test and deploy a voice application which could resolve 80% of all issues relating to the decoder upgrade," says Fick. "By 2pm that same day Intelleca had developed and deployed the entire emergency error handling application. The application was a resounding success and automated in excess of 30 000 calls, proving Intelleca`s expertise in the call automation environment."
Once the upgrade was over, Intelleca completed the DStv decoder on-screen error solving application. The system is designed to interact with the caller in the same way an agent would. For example, the agent says, "I need you to go and get your smart card out of the decoder. Go and get it now. I will wait for you. When you have it just press the hash key and I will continue to help you out." The system continues to offer options until the problem is solved.
"The MultiChoice deployment is a perfect example of what can happen when you marry the three components of a successful system: software, industry expertise, and a client that supports the development and implementation process," says Shaun Cochrane, director of Intelleca.
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