Methods and apparatus for providing live agent assistance

• US 6,771,766 B1
• Filed: 04/18/2000
• Issued: 08/03/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 08/31/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Rakuten, Inc. (Rakuten Group, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Verizon Services Corporation (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Inventors: Shafiee, Mohammad Reza, Subramanian, Sankar
• Primary Examiner(s): Matar, Ahmad F.
• Assistant Examiner(s): AL AUBAIDI, RASHA S
• Application Number:
  US09/551,758
• Time in Patent Office: 1,568 Days
• Field of Search: 379/265.09, 379/202.01, 379/266.09, 379/265.13
• US Class Current: 379/265.09
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/5191 interacting with the Internet
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0036 where the data service is an information service
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/0039 where the data service is provided by a stream of packets which are rendered in real time by the receiving terminal network streaming of media packets H04L65/60

Abstract

Establishing a conference between a customer at a customer terminal and a live agent at an agent station, by (a) accepting a call request from the customer terminal, (b) requesting that an available live agent take the call request, (c) when a live agent becomes available to take the call request, passing customer information to the agent station associated with the available live agent, and (d) establishing a conference from the agent station associated with the available live agent to the customer terminal. The conference may be an audio-video conference. The audio-video conference may be compliant with the H.323 standard. The call request may generated in response to an event sensed by an API which was previously downloaded to the customer terminal from a web server. The call request may be generated in response to a trigger event. The trigger event may be a customer request for a live agent, adding an item to a virtual shopping cart, adding items having a total purchase prices of more than a predetermined threshold to a virtual shopping cart, removing an item from a virtual shopping cart, dwelling at a certain web page for more than a predetermined length of time, rendering certain content, rendering a certain sequence of content, filling out a form, or issuing a particular command. The customer information may include an Internet protocol address of the customer terminal, a video capability of the customer terminal, and/or a browser type used by the customer terminal.

Claims

1. A method for establishing a conference between a customer at a customer terminal and a live agent at an agent station, the method comprising steps of:

a) accepting a call request from the customer terminal;

b) requesting that an available live agent take the call request;

c) when a live agent becomes available to take the call request, passing customer information to the agent station associated with the available live agent; and

d) establishing a conference from the agent station associated with the available live agent to the customer terminal,

wherein the call request is generated in response to a trigger event, the trigger event selected from a group of events consisting of;

adding an item to a virtual shopping cart;

adding items having a total purchase prices of more than a predetermined threshold to a virtual shopping cart; and

removing an item from a virtual shopping cart.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the group further includes rendering certain content;

and rendering a certain sequence of content.

3. In a system having a site server, a web call request processor and at least one live agent at at least one agent station, a method of invoking the establishment of a conference between a customer at a customer terminal and a live agent at an agent station, the method comprising steps of:

a) accepting, from the site server, an “

invoke call”

application program interface;

b) determining whether or not a “

call agent”

event has occurred;

c) if it has been determined that a “

call agent”

event has occurred, then notifying the web request processor using the “

invoke call”

application program interface; and

d) if it has been determined that a page load script has been received, then

i) opening a new window,

ii) determining whether or not conferencing software is available to the customer terminal, and

iii) if it has been determined that conferencing software is available to the customer terminal, then

A) loading the conferencing software, and

B) submitting a conference establishment request to the web request processor.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the invoke call application program interface is part of a web page.

5. The method of claim 3 wherein the conferencing software is compliant with the H.323 standard.

6. The method of claim 3 wherein the conference establishment request includes at least one of (a) a video capability of the customer terminal;

and (b) a browser type used by the customer terminal.

7. In a system having a customer terminal and a web conference request processor for establishing a conference between a customer at the customer terminal and a live agent at an agent station, a method for controlling a site server, the method comprising steps of:

a) if a request for content has been received from the customer terminal, forwarding the requested content to the customer terminal;

b) if a trigger event occurs, providing an “

invoke call”

application program interface to the customer terminal,

wherein the trigger event is selected from a group of events consisting of;

adding an item to a virtual shopping cart;

adding items having a total purchase prices of more than a predetermined threshold to a virtual shopping cart;

removing an item from a virtual shopping cart; and

dwelling at a certain web page for more than a predetermined length of time.

8. The method of claim 7 further comprising a step of:

c) maintaining a transaction history log of actions taken by, and information received from, the customer terminal.

9. The method of claim 8 further comprising a step of:

d) if a trigger event occurs, forwarding the transaction history log to the web conference request processor.

10. The method of claim 7 wherein the group further includes rendering certain content;

and rendering a certain sequence of content.