Call centers have recently become a flourishing industry, offering thousands of jobs all around the world to those with good communication skills and flexible schedules. If you are interested in call centers you might have a few questions about some of the terms associated with call centers. You are not alone. Even though the term "call center" has become more popular in recent years, with the many different ideas connected with call centers there are those of us who are still in the dark about what a call center really is. A call center is an office commissioned to the handling of incoming calls for a company's customers. Over the phone, their customer service department daily handles customer questions, complaints, etc. However, they not only communicate through telephones, but also through fax, e-mail, and letters. Another primary focus of call centers is the outgoing calls to customers for a company. This may include telemarketing and technical support. The average call center is a large room composed of smaller workstations that contain a computer, a telephone, and a headset hooked into a telecom switch. Each workstation may be independent or connected to a network. Technology is constantly changing the day to day business of call centers. Many call centers now days use CTI or computer telephony integration, which is defined as "technology that allows interactions on a telephone and a computer to be integrated or co-ordinated. As contact channels have expanded from voice to include email, web, and fax, the definition of CTI has expanded to include the integration of all customer contact channels (voice, email, web, fax, etc.) with computer systems." Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_telephony_integration To conclude, whether it is customer support or telemarketing a call center is where a high-volume of communication takes place between the customer and the company from day to day. |
