Customer relationship management system with network contact center server configured to control automated web and voice dialogues

• US 8,024,401 B1
• Filed: 06/03/2002
• Issued: 09/20/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/2002
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Sound View Innovations, LLC (Sound View Innovation Holdings, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Klemm, Reinhard P., Zhou, Gang, Hiering, Victoria, Gurbani, Vijay K., Hull, Richard B., Gokhale, Aniruddha, Nieto, Luis, Sabnis, Suhasini, Kumar, Bharat
• Primary Examiner(s): Refai; Ramsey
• Application Number:
  US10/161,040
• Time in Patent Office: 3,396 Days
• Field of Search: 379/265.12, 37926501-26601, 709/204, 709/227
• US Class Current: 709/204
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

A customer relationship management system is disclosed for matching a given work item with an agent. The system includes a database to hold customer information, agent information, and system information, and a network contact center server operative to receive the given work item from the customer and route it to the agent based at least in part on the information in the database. The network contact center server is configured to control the conduction of an automated web dialogue with the customer via a separate web server and is further configured to control the conduction of an automated voice dialogue with the customer via an interactive voice response system. The automated web dialogue and the automated voice dialogue are thereby both conductable under the control of the network contact center server.

Claims

1. A system for matching a given work item with an agent, the given work item being one of a plurality of work items transported from a customer to an agent by way of a network, the system comprising:

a database to hold customer information, agent information, and system information; and

a network contact center server, the server operative to receive the given work item from the customer and route it to the agent based at least in part on the information in the database;

wherein the network contact center server is configured to control the conduction of an automated web dialogue with the customer via a separate web server and is further configured to control the conduction of an automated voice dialogue with the customer via an interactive voice response system, the automated web dialogue and the automated voice dialogue thereby both being conductable under the control of the network contact center server.

2. The system of claim 1 comprising a plurality of agents which are geographically distributed.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the network contact center server routes the given work item to the agent according to at least one flow logic instruction.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein the flow logic instruction routes the given work item to the agent according to an agent profile.

5. The system of claim 4 wherein the agent profile comprises data regarding an agent skill set.

6. The system of claim 3 wherein the flow logic instruction routes the given work item to the agent according to a time of day that the work item was created.

7. The system of claim 3 wherein the flow logic instruction routes the given work item to the agent according to a day of the week that the work item was created.

8. The system of claim 3 wherein the flow logic instruction performs load balancing to route the given work item to the agent attending to the fewest number of work items.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the network contact center server utilizes at least one of the web server and the interactive voice response system to collect additional information from the customer.

10. The system of claim 9 wherein the network contact center server merges the additional information collected from the customer into the given work item.

11. The system of claim 1 wherein the automated dialogues are stored on the database.

12. The system of claim 1 wherein the network contact center server queries an agent profile to determine whether an appropriate agent is occupied and, if so, to place the given work item in a queue.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein the network contact center server routes the given work item to an agent if the agent is not occupied.

14. The system of claim 12 wherein the network contact center server periodically queries the agent to determine agent availability.

15. The system of claim 14 wherein the network contact center server queries the agent to determine the agent'"'"'s availability when a user defined threshold has been exceeded.

16. The system of claim 14 wherein the network contact center server removes the given work item from the queue and routes the given work item to the agent when the agent becomes available.

17. The system of claim 12 wherein, after a time period has elapsed, the network contact center server removes the given work item from the queue and routes the work item to any available agent.

18. The system of claim 1 wherein the network contact center server places the given work item on a queue based on a broad category of support required to satisfy the work item.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the network contact center server decides, once an agent becomes available, from which queue the given work item should be taken.