Coordinating work assignments for contact center agents
First Claim
1. A method for assigning to at least one agent, of a plurality of agents for a contact center, a work item, wherein a call distribution component for the contact center receives a plurality of incoming work items and routes the incoming work items to selected ones of the plurality of agents according to agent availability, comprising:
- receiving a proxy call at a site for a selected agent, wherein the proxy call relates to assigning a work item to the selected agent such that the proxy call is not the work item;
wherein the selected agent is selected by the call distribution component from one of the agents of a group of one or more agents, and the call distribution component routes the proxy call to the site;
after the agent is selected, obtaining from the proxy call, work item related information wherein the work item related information is used to access at least one of;
additional data indicative of the work item, and an application for performing the work item;
requesting that the call distribution component designate the selected agent as unavailable for taking a subsequent one of the incoming calls;
providing, to the selected agent, at least one of;
the additional data indicative of the work item, and the application for performing the work item; and
discontinuing the proxy call prior to the selected agent completing the work item.
20 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A method and system for assigning tasks to contact center agents is disclosed, wherein an automatic call distributor (ACD) used for distributing incoming contact center calls to the agents is used to distribute other tasks to the agents. When an agent task (different from handling an incoming call) is determined, a corresponding “proxy” telephone call is generated from within the contact center to a PBX to assign an agent to the task. The ACD processes the proxy call substantially identically to any other incoming call requesting an agent'"'"'s services. A proxy call has as its destination phone number the directory number of a call group used in selecting an appropriate agent for performing the task. The proxy call phone number additionally identifies the location of detailed information about the task. When a proxy call is routed by the ACD to the selected agent'"'"'s worksite, the called phone number is used to fetch the detailed task information, and the selected agent is made unavailable to the ACD for further incoming calls. The agent is made available for taking contact center incoming calls when the task is completed or pre-empted.
-
Citations
25 Claims
-
1. A method for assigning to at least one agent, of a plurality of agents for a contact center, a work item, wherein a call distribution component for the contact center receives a plurality of incoming work items and routes the incoming work items to selected ones of the plurality of agents according to agent availability, comprising:
-
receiving a proxy call at a site for a selected agent, wherein the proxy call relates to assigning a work item to the selected agent such that the proxy call is not the work item; wherein the selected agent is selected by the call distribution component from one of the agents of a group of one or more agents, and the call distribution component routes the proxy call to the site; after the agent is selected, obtaining from the proxy call, work item related information wherein the work item related information is used to access at least one of;
additional data indicative of the work item, and an application for performing the work item;requesting that the call distribution component designate the selected agent as unavailable for taking a subsequent one of the incoming calls; providing, to the selected agent, at least one of;
the additional data indicative of the work item, and the application for performing the work item; anddiscontinuing the proxy call prior to the selected agent completing the work item. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
-
-
19. An apparatus for assigning at least one agent, of a plurality of agents for a contact center, a task to be performed, wherein a call distribution component for the contact center receives a plurality of incoming work items directed to the contact center and routes the incoming work items to selected ones of the plurality of agents according to agent availability, comprising:
-
a monitor for obtaining agent request data for assigning some one of the agents to perform a task; a caller component for initiating, for the agent request data, a proxy call corresponding to the task to a group of one or more of the agents, wherein the proxy call provides predetermined task related information for performing the task, and wherein the proxy call is not the task; an agent workstation for receiving the mom call for a selected one of the agents from the group, wherein the call distribution component selects the selected agent and routes the proxy call to the selected agent; wherein the call distribution component uses the predetermined task related information in determining at least the group; an agent server for detecting the predetermined task related information from the proxy call; identifying, using the predetermined task related information, the task; requesting that the call distribution component designate the selected agent as unavailable for taking a subsequent one of the incoming work items; and terminating the proxy call prior to the selected agent completing the task. - View Dependent Claims (20, 21)
-
-
22. An apparatus for assigning at least one agent, of a plurality of agents for a contact center, a task to be performed, wherein a call distribution component for the contact center receives a plurality of incoming work items directed to the contact center and routes the incoming work items to selected ones of the plurality of agents according to agent availability, comprising:
-
means for receiving a proxy call at a site for a selected agent, wherein the proxy call relates to assigning a work item to the selected agent, and wherein the proxy call is not the work item; wherein the selected agent is selected by the call distribution component from one of the agents of a group of one or more agents, and the call distribution component routes the proxy call to the site; means for obtaining from the proxy call, work item related information, wherein the work item related information is used to access at least one of;
additional data indicative of the work item, and an application for performing the work item;wherein the means for obtaining the work item related information is performed after the selected agent is selected; requesting that the call distribution component designate the selected agent as unavailable for taking a subsequent one of the incoming calls; providing, to the selected agent, at least one of;
the additional data indicative of the work item, and the application for performing the work item; andterminating the proxy call prior to the selected agent completing the work item.
-
-
23. An apparatus for assigning to at least one agent, of a plurality of agents for a contact center, a work item, wherein a call distribution component for the contact center receives a plurality of work items directed to the contact center and routes the incoming work items to selected ones of the plurality of agents according to agent availability, wherein the apparatus performs at least the following steps:
-
detecting agent request data for assigning one of the agents to perform the work item, wherein the agent request data is generated by an agent request generating system, wherein the agent request generating system generates the agent request data without resolving conflicting requests for an agent with at least the call distribution component; initializing a proxy call to a predetermined group of one or more agents, wherein the proxy call is initiated in response to detecting the agent request data, and the proxy call has associated therewith work item related information, and wherein the proxy call is not the work item; receiving the proxy call at a site for a selected agent; wherein the selected agent is selected by the call distribution component from one of the agents of the group; after the agent is selected, obtaining from the proxy call, the work item related information, wherein the work item related information is used to access at least one of;
additional data indicative of the work item, and an application for performing the work item;requesting that the call distribution component designate the selected agent as unavailable for taking a subsequent one of the incoming calls; and terminating the proxy call prior to the selected agent completing the work item. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25)
-
Specification