ntl
has installed Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Southampton, enabling passengers to call up for real time flight information. ÊIn addition, calls can be routed to any of the airport business partners, including car hire companies and hotels, and other airport services. ntl is already working with BAA to provide communications infrastructure to Heathrow’s Terminal 5.

Four BAA airports that have installed the automated system, which is based on ntl’s Customer Contact Management (CCM) solution. Before installing IVR, staff handled all calls at three of the airports and the fourth had a single site automated system. Now staff can concentrate on being more traveller-focused and dealing with complex telephone queries, whilst the ntl solution handles the simple calls.

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Information requested by a caller is delivered via concatenated speech, a synthesised speech system that splices and rearranges recorded words and phrases into sentences. BAA can also elect to play a specific message at the start of every customer call, for instance to announce weather conditions or news of a major event that might affect all travellers, which can be removed or updated instantaneously.

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Hugh Aitken, Head of Strategy and Business Performance at BAA said: “ntl’s technical solution was head and shoulders above others we considered, not just in terms of meeting the requirements of our passengers, but in terms of the resilience it could offer and the contingency built into the system. Since installing at the end of February we’ve been able to improve our customer service in two ways; firstly staff that previously spent time dealing with simple phone enquiries have been freed up, and they can now focus on travellers on-site and more complex calls. Secondly customers that phone in with simple queries are being given real-time information.”

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Simon Tse, Business Services Director, ntl Celtic Region, said: “We all strive to deliver excellent customer service, and automated customer response solutions play an important part in that delivery - they’re an every day part of business nowadays. Our customer management solutions offer leading edge functionality such as concatenated speech systems, IVR technology and advanced reporting tools, and because they are flexible we can specifically meet our customer’s requirements. And as someone that frequents Glasgow airport in particular I’m delighted ntl is providing the IVR solution.”

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ntl’s Customer Contact Management services provide advanced inbound voice number translation for non-geographic number services including Freephone, Local rate and National rate calls. Customers can enhance their service by selecting one of five optional packages, including functionality such as time of day routing, area code routing and Network IVR, plus a range of new features provided by Cisco’s ICM platform.

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