Winners and Losers – Sept 2011

The industry seems to be vibrant with stories of good news, award wins and contract wins.

This month we give a mention to Sutton Council, Indigo Lighthouse, myPAlive! Ltd, Prolog, Novacroft, 2Touch and Spark Response.

Sutton scores customer service hat trick

Sutton Council has scooped a third major award for having the best customer service in London.

Staff at Sutton's Revenues & Benefits Contact Centre

Sutton’s Revenues and Benefits contact centre, which deals with an average of 12,000 calls per month, came top out of 33 London boroughs in a mystery shopping exercise carried out by Customer Services for London Group.

The team was judged the winner after a series of telephone calls were made posing various scenarios around housing and council tax benefit.

Judges praised them for their call handling, knowledge, customer satisfaction and professionalism.

Cllr Ruth Dombey, Deputy Leader on Sutton Council, said: “This accomplishment reflects the quality of service Sutton Revenues and Benefits contact centre delivers and I would like to thank the team for their consistent professionalism and hard work.”

Alan Cox

Indigo Lighthouse is looking to fight off competition from Barclays Wealth, Nationwide and Prudential at the Customer Contact Association (CCA) awards after making the finalist line-up for ‘Most Effective Training Programme’ and ‘Great Places to Work’ categories.

The eCommerce provider is already established in many areas of business process outsourcing with its multi-lingual contact centre already enjoying industry recognition – this success continues as the contact centre is nominated for ‘Small Contact Centre of the Year’ at the European Call Centre and Customer Service Awards in recognition of its outstanding commitment to customer service excellence.

Alan Cox, Indigo Lighthouse’s CEO, said: “Appearing alongside some of the most recognised brands in the world on the shortlist is a huge achievement for us in itself and a reflection of the emphasis and focus of our business on customer service excellence.

“Our people are the key to our success and we are extremely proud to be recognised for our commitment and investment in staff training. Not only is it fundamental to our business but it also allows us to continue operating at the forefront of the industry.”

myPAlive! Ltd has been awarded the gold standard ISO9001 accreditation.

The Liverpool-based call centre operation

The company delivers professional call handling and telephone answering services to organisations across the UK, with clients including Vodafone, Save the Children and Whitbread Group.

Dellah Pollock, myPAlive!’s client services manager, said: ”Gold standard ISO9001 is the ultimate in state-of-the-art external recognition and we are delighted to have achieved this status. In a time of recession our clients are focused on creating an unrivalled customer experience to retain business and working with ISO accredited service providers is most often the preferred way of doing this.”

Debra Charles

Novacroft has been awarded the contract to manage Transport for London’s concessionary Oyster photocard schemes for three years from 1st July 2011, with a possible two-year extension. The contract award comes following a competitive re-tender process.

Having managed TfL’s concessionary Oyster photocard schemes since 2001, Novacroft has a proven track record of success in the TfL environment, and offers a fully integrated end-to-end solution including card production, card management, contact centre services and software design and implementation.

Debra Charles, Novacroft’s Managing Director, commented: “To win this contract is a testament to Novacroft’s quality of service delivery and to the efforts of the team. Novacroft’s service to Transport for London meets the challenge of combining quality, innovation and capacity for improvement with value for money. Novacroft looks forward to continuing to work with Transport for London.”

Staff at 2Touch have raised £350 for Macmillan Cancer Support following a raffle for sweet-toothed employees.  To date, the firm has raised over £4,000 for the charity and has a target of reaching £5,000 by the end of the year.

Lynn Kane, facilities office services manager at 2Touch, successfully rallied staff to raise money for the charity through a series of successful fundraising initiatives.

Lynn said: “Macmillan is very close to my heart, as a cancer patient myself I cannot praise the charity enough for the great help and assistance it has given to me.

“It relies heavily on donations from large organisations such as ourselves to provide funding for numerous initiatives such as support groups, the upkeep of facilities as well as funding Macmillan nurses who provide much needed practical and emotional support to patients and their families across the region.”

To raise the £350 Lynn raffled off tickets to sweet-toothed colleagues. The lucky winner, Sue Butler, a sales adviser, received a 4.5kg chocolate bar.

Lynn added: “I would like to thank everyone at 2Touch for their support in helping me raise the money, they have put their hands in their pockets and generously donated to the cause.”

Peter Slee

Staff at Spark Response have now raised £2,700 for Barnardo’s through a series of events including a family fun day, which was held at its site in Follingsby Park.

The Gateshead-based contact centre and fulfilment specialist has been raising funds for the charity throughout 2011 and the latest event to be staged was a circus-themed family fun day, with staff, including Managing Director, Peter Slee, dressed as clowns and overseen by a ringmaster.

Attractions on the day included a human wrecking ball, bungee run, stilt walkers and a magician and fire-eater.  Despite the torrential rain, the fun day was well attended by Spark staff and their family and friends who took shelter under the 100ft marquee.

Speaking of the event, Spark’s Managing Director, Peter Slee, said: “Once again the Spark fun day has been a great success and not only is it a great way to say thank you to the whole team for their hard work, we have also managed to raise much-needed funds for Barnardo’s North East.”

Craig Jones

Craig Jones from Message Pad recently entered into a competition called Open Mic UK 2011, which searches for a new un-signed recording artist, giving them the chance of a record deal.

Having gone to the auditions and competed against hundreds of other artists, Craig got through to the regional finals which will be held at Sheffield City Hall on the 25th September 2011, where industry experts and celebrity judges will be judging the performances. The best will be put through to the Grand Final at the London O2 Arena in January to compete with the chance of winning a recording contract.

Craig has been working at Message Pad since the age of 16 where he worked a Saturday shift, before progressing into a full-time shift in 2008. He says: “I have been singing since the age of 9 and it is something I have always loved to do but I never shared it with my family or friends until the age of 15 when I asked to have singing lessons.”

Craig studied Music as an A-Level and took part in all of the productions and performances at school. “I really enjoyed performing in front of an audience and realised it’s something I would love to pursue but never had the confidence to go for it,” continues Craig.

After his A-Levels, Craig pursued the singing as well as working and going to auditions for various shows, performances and talent contests. He likes to perform in local bars and pubs with his guitarist Chris and in September he is planning on starting an Adult Nursing Course at the University of Nottingham. “I want to continue to pursue Nursing as it’s something I am really passionate about doing. But I’ll always strive to do music, I’d hate to reach a certain age in my life and wish I had done things I always wanted to do but never did. I am really excited about the regional finals and cannot wait to perform in such a great venue to try gain my place in the finals at the O2 Arena,” concludes Craig.

7 Sep 2011 - Filed under Call Centre News

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