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WECU
A Good Call
WECU increases productivity with user-friendly UC & Contact Center.
In 1935, when credit unions were helping Americans through the Great Depression, the treasurer of a Midwestern credit union said that credit unions were, “not for profit, not for charity, but for service,” and that philosophy holds true today. Credit unions continue to look out for the interests of their members and provide a level of service that is not generally available at other financial institutions. Whether it’s providing a loan to help a member cover unexpected medical bills, giving financial counseling to a member whose company closed its doors, or simply offering a better deal on a used car loan, credit unions make a difference for their members and the communities they serve.
Technology Partner
Solutions Provided
- Faced with an expiring lease on their existing telephony platform, WECU was looking to enhance their productivity through a more user-friendly UC platform, and to implement a more robust call center.
- After a comprehensive vendor/platform evaluation process, Cerium was selected as the vendor of choice, with Microsoft Lync as the UC platform, and Enghouse Interactive Communications Center (EICC) for the Lync-native call center.
- Cerium preceded the Lync deployment with the implementation of Microsoft Exchange.
- The transition to the new EICC platform was quickly implemented, as it was intuitive to use for existing agents.
- Cerium provided a “train-the-trainer” approach to end-user training for the Lync deployment.
Enghouse Interactive Communications Center
Because the existing call center was efficiently designed, the transition to the new Enghouse platform was quickly implemented. Patti Moser, Project Manager for WECU, explained that very little change was needed to the auto-attendant. “WECU didn’t perform any significant initial expansions during the Enghouse deployment. We wanted to make sure we fully understood how the system performed before making changes. The call center agents had no issues with the new system and adopted it with ease. The EICC system was much more intuitive to use for our existing agents. We added two new departments as stand-alone divisions: Collections and Card Services. Since they were new to the call center practice, their adoption and efficiency took longer.” Patti went on to say that with the Enghouse system it is easy to make changes. “The call center manager can make changes with little assistance from either Cerium or Enghouse.”
The call center agents are primarily using Touchpoint, the EICC soft consoles, and headsets in their daily practice, giving the call center statistical information as well as advanced call handling capabilities. Cerium deploys Polycom phones with all our Lync systems. Those agents that rotate desks, or are not full-time agents have Polycom phones as opposed to headsets with soft consoles.
With a successful rollout and ease of use, WECU is already looking at enhancing the overall member experience by taking advantage of the feature-rich EICC platform, and evaluating offering chat to its members. The EICC platform also offers WECU the ability for their members to hold their place in queue with the call back application, as well as provide statistical information in real time, with the configurable dashboard/wallboard application known as SnapShot. The new EICC platform enhances the overall member and agent experience.
With a successful rollout and ease of use, WECU is already looking at enhancing the overall member experience by taking advantage of the feature-rich EICC platform, and evaluating offering chat to its members. The EICC platform also offers WECU the ability for their members to hold their place in queue with the call back application, as well as provide statistical information in real time, with the configurable dashboard/wallboard application known as SnapShot. The new EICC platform enhances the overall member and agent experience.
Training
Cerium provided a “train-the-trainer” approach to end-user training for the Lync deployment at WECU. “Forty to fifty end-users were trained, and carried that information back to their branch locations to train additional staff,” explains Patti. In retrospect, and as a lessons learned initiative, Patti says that they found most employees preferred the initial and more formal classroom format offered by Cerium.
“For our staff, there were more people that really wanted classroom style training, and this is a business decision/preference. I would encourage companies to poll managers and staff about what kind of training they would prefer. We have conducted additional training sessions internally to create better engagement and employee comfort.” The WECU Training Department is developing more in-depth training on using the UC features so that people can attend remotely.
Susan Anderson, Cerium’s Contact Center Practice Lead, and Pam Treischel, a Contact Center Specialist at Cerium, “left a phenomenal impression on the call center staff,” said Patti. “They did an amazing job in making sure people had the information they needed to adopt the new system.”
“For our staff, there were more people that really wanted classroom style training, and this is a business decision/preference. I would encourage companies to poll managers and staff about what kind of training they would prefer. We have conducted additional training sessions internally to create better engagement and employee comfort.” The WECU Training Department is developing more in-depth training on using the UC features so that people can attend remotely.
Susan Anderson, Cerium’s Contact Center Practice Lead, and Pam Treischel, a Contact Center Specialist at Cerium, “left a phenomenal impression on the call center staff,” said Patti. “They did an amazing job in making sure people had the information they needed to adopt the new system.”
Our element is communication
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Effective communication is the essential element found in all successful business relationships. Employee productivity and customer satisfaction can rise and fall based on this key element. Cerium is in the business of taking basic business communication to new levels of collaboration with our industry-leading solutions designed to keep workers and customers engaged. So, we understand the importance of effective communication.
