When operating a call center is a core part of your business, it’s critical to have a reliable and cost effective communications system.

An acquisition of a branch office in Houston, Texas, led Verified Credentials to experience a 33% increase in phone traffic. The company has more than doubled in size the last three years, going from 45 to 111 employees.

With the increased phone traffic came a substantial increase in long distance phone charges. From an operations and customer service standpoint, Verified Credentials knew the timing was right to take advantage of VoIP technology to replace their traditional PBX system.

In January 2004, Marco implemented a Mitel 3300 VoIP system for Verified Credentials with Automated Call Center Distribution (ACD) software for up to 90 agents. Marco also replaced their core network equipment with a Power over Ethernet network to accommodate the VoIP.

According to Tim Davis, Verified Credentials’ IT Manager, there were three primary reasons for making a decision to transition to VoIP. “We wanted to connect our remote offices and salespeople (via Teleworker) on the same phone network to save on long distance charges between each entity,” explained Tim. The company figures they have saved over $25,000 in long distance charges since the implementation of the new system.

They also had a goal of implementing a structured ACD Queue environment for their support/sales departments with measurable reporting functions. Marco installed prairieFyre reporting software which allows them to view real-time status on ACD call queues and generate daily reports to measure overall productivity - tools they did not have with their PBX system. Tim said, “It gave us a direction on how to answer calls and measure and increase our productivity. The biggest impact is that it allows us to hire fewer people.”

The third reason for upgrading to VoIP was being able to eliminate manual line moves when employees relocate within their building. Tim explained, “The ability to have our remote salespeople and workers be able to plug in their phones seamlessly to the Internet is the biggest advantage. In addition, we used to spend 200 hours per year just in moving internal phone lines. Now we just plug the phones in and we’re ready to go. This has been a real time saver for us.”

Verified Credentials was pleased with how Marco designed and implemented their network and VoIP system. “They showed us how the system should operate from a business standpoint, versus just a technical standpoint,” said Tim referring to their Marco Account Manager, Chad Vukich. “They made us think about how we want to operate in the future. We can go up to 350 employees with our phone system without having any bottlenecks.”

Tim feels they now have everything Verified Credentials was looking for in a new system. "It has allowed our company to save thousands in long distance charges, implement an inbound support call center, and reduce overall support time on routine tasks.” The applications implemented will also allow them to integrate with other in-house applications such as caller ID. “It opened the door for us to develop projects like this in the future,” said Tim. “Chad Vukich has always been proactive in communicating new technologies or add-ons for our IP system."