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iLink– Fall, 2005
Old
Dominion Freight Line Offloads Over 1,000,000 Calls
Annually
Significant
productivity gains realized with iVoice
IVR
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Since
1934, Old
Dominion Freight Line, Inc. has been offering services
as a less-than-truckload general commodities carrier.
Known in the industry as "OD", the company
is headquartered in Thomasville, NC and is in the midst
of a five-year growth pattern averaging 15-20% annual
growth.
Today,
OD has 152 service centers in 44 states throughout
United States with 100% full- state coverage in 32
of the 44 states. OD offers international shipping
to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, as well.
Benefits
of IVR
Several years back, OD first realized that IVR could provide a cost-effective
communication mechanism with customers and drivers. In fact, OD previously
implemented a UNIX-based IVR solution that provided very good efficiencies
within the organization. However, when OD wanted to expand the system
with new features, several limitations were identified in the existing
system. Barry Craver, Senior Applications Development Manager for OD
recalls, "We had several issues with our existing IVR, so it made
sense to start looking at what else the market had to offer. The old
IVR required a proprietary programming language and communication with
our AS/400 was by screen scrape; changes to our AS/400 applications would
wreck havoc with the IVR because of the screen scrape. In addition, because
of the proprietary nature of the system, we relied on a single person
to do development work. Finally, we were looking to add new IVR applications
requiring Text-to-Speech and the old system could not support that technology.
The time was right to start looking to see what else was available."
OD's
search ultimately led them to iMessaging System's
iVoice IVR. "iVoice offered us the ability to
develop IVR applications without any special training – anyone
on staff can write iVoice applications because it's
all AS/400-based. Also, changes to AS/400 applications
like our dispatch system never affect the operation
of iVoice," notes Craver.
Bob
Newingham, OD's Systems/Analyst for automated dispatching
systems, has primary responsibility for iVoice. Bob
cites several reasons why the system made sense from
his standpoint: "The programmer efficiencies
we gained were big – we leveraged existing
work by creating entry points to our existing code
so that we did not have to duplicate logic. We also
found that iMessaging provides quicker response and
more knowledgeable support, from installation to
ongoing support. iVoice gave us new features like
Text-to-Speech and the ability to monitor the system
remotely, too."
But
the most significant benefits iVoice offered were
a lower total cost of ownership and a 50% reduction
in call time on driver calls. Newingham notes, "Our
old IVR had a lot of system overhead with screen
scraping and sending data back and forth to the AS/400." iVoice
is so much faster than the previous IVR system, that
when iVoice was originally implemented, OD had to
slow down driver calls because drivers wanted the
interaction slightly slower. "The increase in
calls we can handle has been a major improvement
with iVoice. We now service more calls, more quickly.
In fact, iVoice will offload over 1,000,000 calls
for us this year alone," touts Newingham.
OD
IVR Applications
To date, OD has implemented two primary applications with the iVoice;
one services driver transactions and the other handles customer service
inquiries.
The
driver system allows OD drivers to handle the entire
dispatching process without the need to involve a "live" dispatcher.
The driver system provides the ability for OD drivers
to obtain their assignment from plans created by
the central dispatch system. Drivers call iVoice
when they are at the OD service center and are provided
with "load assignments" that they will
pull for that work shift. Drivers can also "dispatch" themselves
as well as "arrive" themselves at their
intended destination. Furthermore, the OD technical
team has included facilities within iVoice for the
system to handle the "meet & turn" process.
A "meet & turn" is when two drivers
meet at a predefined location between two OD service
centers and exchange trailers. Each driver then returns
to his or her domicile terminal with the exchanged
load.
The
customer service applications offer OD customers
telephone self-service options for shipment tracking,
rate quotes and transit times. The iVoice system
even provides the ability for customers to request
a faxed copy of the proof of delivery document through
integration with two complementary iSeries solutions,
Quadrant's FastFax server and imaging.
Looking
ahead, OD has identified future iVoice applications
for both drivers and customer service. OD will be
expanding IVR services to include leased drivers.
The leased driver application will service pickup
and movement of "containers" from large
shipping ports. OD primarily uses leased drivers
for the container operation and pickups are done
from various points that involve transportation from
city/state to city/state. The use of Text-to-Speech
software, an integrated service of iVoice, will be
used to generate the speech associated with the city/state
locations. Text-to-Speech is used when dynamic voice
messages are a requirement, such as with addresses,
cities, names or special instructions. OD leased
drivers will use the system to call iVoice to retrieve
their next assignment. On the customer service side,
OD is considering providing the ability for customers
to make payments via credit card using an iSeries-based
credit card processing capability developed in house.
Conclusion
Barry Craver sums it up this way: "When we found iVoice, it all
came down to three main factors: maintainability, total cost and features.
iVoice delivered it all and we have been very pleased with our choice.
With 1,000,000 calls serviced annually and the number growing, the system
has been an excellent investment for us."
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We
CONNECT people to enhance communications. Now, we'd like
to CONNECT you with today's latest music, FREE!
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Our
iNspire Call Center Suite provides the tools to connect people with people and data to enhance telephone
communications.
More specifically, iNspire delivers caller self-service
with IVR and enhances agent-assisted telephone calls
with intelligent routing, queuing and screen pops.
Making connections is truly the premise behind the
solutions that iMessaging delivers to our clients.
Now, we’re announcing an exciting new referral
program and asking for your help to connect us with
potential clients.
So,
how do we connect people, you ask?
Take as an example, United States Warranty Corporation.
US Warranty was
looking for a way to improve the process used to
service new
auto repair claims by phone. They wanted a solution
to connect auto repair facilities to CSRs
in the most efficient way possible. Now, iNspire
greets the
caller and automates the prescreening process by asking
several up-front questions. Often, the automated system
provides the claim authorization on the spot but, if
more information is required, iNspire connects the
caller, along with a screen pop of the data collected,
directly
to a live CSR. The iNspire solution shaved valuable
time off of each new claims call, allowing the CSRs
to be
more productive while maintaining a personalized
experience for the caller.
So,
connect us with a referral for our
iNspire Call Center Suite between now and December
31st and we’ll connect you
with a FREE Apple iPod! Contact your account manager
or our sales team by phone at 866-467-5483 or by
email at info@iMessagingSystems.com and
we’ll fill
you in on all the details!
Note:
iPod delivery following lead close. Lead close must
occur within 6 months of referral date.
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Recently, iSeries
News announced its Readers'
Choice Awards - What is your Favorite Software?
iSeries
news will publish the winners in future issues, as
a series of short profiles.
 We
encourage you to vote for the iSeries software product
or products that you feel have been a wonderful addition
to your business. And, if you feel that our iNspire
Call Center Suite or iVoice
IVR has bailed you out of a jam, saved
you and your staff significant amounts of time, provided
a good ROI or streamlined business processes, please
tell the editors!
Please
follow the link below and complete the iSeries News
electronic voting form. It will take less than 10
minutes. http://www.iseriesnetwork.com/ReadersChoice/
Thank
you for your consideration!
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iVoice™ –
Proper Prompt Protocol (say that 3 times fast!)
Did you know that voice prompts must be recorded in a certain format
to play back over your phone lines? Our iVoice controllers use
INTEL Dialogic cards and software to integrate with your telephone
system. Today, Dialogic cards support only 11 kHz, 8-bit,
Mono and 8 Khz, 8-bit, Mono PCM wave file
formats. When compared to CD quality at 44.1 kHz, 16-bit,
Stereo PCM, there appears to be a huge difference in both
file size and quality. What will your customers think about the
sound quality? Let’s take a closer look.
The
telephone receiver contains a tiny mono speaker,
which plays the voice prompts to the caller.
This little speaker can’t
handle top notch quality sound you may hear at a Rolling Stones
concert because the telephone speaker is limited. When sound
files are recorded and played back on your computer
using the iVoice Prompt
Recorder, they may sound a little scratchy and fuzzy. This is
due to the quality the prompts are recorded at
and the speaker they
are being played back on. When the same files are played back
through the phone line, they will sound different
because they going through
the less sophisticated mono speaker of your handset.
If
you think your prompts still have a little extra
snap, crackle and pop, check where you are working
and what you are working with:
- Are
you
are using a proper unidirectional noise-canceling
microphone? One is included with every iVoice system.
- Does
your computer have enough available memory
and a newer sound card? The lack of robust
computer hardware may have an adverse affect.
- Are
you recording in the computer room with fans
and other background noise? Try recording
in a quiet conference room
or office.
Additionally,
you can edit the voice prompts using 3rd party
recording software. Many packages are available
for free
on the internet.
These full-feature recording packages usually include
tools to:
- Trim
dead-air
- Reduce
background noise
- Normalize
or amplify the sound
For
more information on voice prompt recording utilities,
tools and best practices, please
contact iMessaging
Technical Support
at:
Email: support@imessagingsystems.com
Phone: 1-603-424-7788
Hours: Monday to Friday, 8:30 am to 5:30 pm,
ET.
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