In the summer of 2017 this insurance company decided that the process of taking care of incoming contacts from different service channels needed to be improved. The situation was that the company had a centralised group level call center and, in addition to this, several different service numbers. The customer service process was often long and in the worst case led to customer churn.

Even though the contact center was operating diligently its effectiveness was not being measured sufficiently. Overall the operating cost ratio of the business was up for an improvement.

The big challenge was to overcome bottle necks in the customer contact processes. This meant the reasons for breaks and delays in customer communications, an understanding of the customer life cycle, better utilisation of human resources and better control of customer information were all on the list to be improved.

Open and confidential dialogue   

So, the discussion about the needs of LähiTapiola Metropolitan Area and what Benemen would have to offer to beat these challenges began. Prior to the purchase decision a thorough consideration of the solution was made.

Factors affecting the customer experience were checked thoroughly. During this process a surprising number of opportunities were found that the Benemen communication solution could improve.

“A prerequisite to a well-functioning solution proposal was open and confidential dialogue about LähiTapiola’s needs, intent and plans” says Sales Director Marko Jokela from Benemen.

It was also important to choose an intelligent solution from the business point of view and to keep the customer experience at the core of all planning.

Everything in order at once

The Benemen solution helped to unblock bottlenecks in the LähiTapiola’s customer service. One of the key factors in the success of the solution is effective usage of analytics. Customer experience can be improved by utilizing analytics in call routing and resource utilization. The Benemen service was criticalto this.

Chief Financial Officer Sakari Pehkonen states that the information collected from the calls enabled significant streamlining of operations: the customer service process was shortened remarkably and calls are now directed to the correct place by intelligent routing and according to the skill and knowledge of their people.

In the previous service process, several contact points were needed to be able to handle the customers case. In addition to this, a call back to the customer was required and often this happened atan inconvenient time from the customer point of view. Now, the customer's call is routed directly to the correct person and the matter is handled at once. Intelligent routing also enables the routing of the calls to the correct place  when they are not meant to be directed to the sales organization.

"The agility of the Benemen cloud service enables continuous improvement of the customer experience. Now that we have been using the BeneCloud for some time and seen its benefits, new ideas are constantly emerging about what could be done even better, "says Sakari Pehkonen.

Improvements measurable in money

The benefits of the new communication solution have convinced Pehkonen. After the introduction of BeneCloud, positive progress has been demonstrated in the business:

• The customer satisfaction of the selected customer segments has improved.
• Measuring efficiency has led to an increase in average sales of 7%, a total of around 600,000€ per year!
• Costs have fallen by 13% and communications can be done with fewer people.
• The degree of First Call Resolution (FCR) has risen 10 percent. Now, nearly ten out of ten cases of the most important clients can be handled during the first call.
• The operating model has been improved with the data collected and analytics
  
  

"Clear improvements occurred when Benemen's intelligent routing was introduced in the contact management process. At the same time, the whole sales organization was able to be utilized to manage contacts in addition to customer service. The centralized call center became a backup arrangement, " Pehkonen says.

Benemen assisting in business development

Pehkonen also notes that before the decision to acquire the BeneCloud service was made, the management of the company had  reservations about intelligent routing and doubted its suitability for the organization. After thorough discussions and asking tough questions the green light was given to the project.

Benemen has been actively involved in the whole process and has played a strong role as a sparring partner. The base and starting point in the process for both parties was business development, and open debates have been had about what is worth doing and what is not.

Pehkonen praises Benemen's ability to keep the customer's point of view top of mind at all times.
When issues were properly fleshed out, and processes were explored and analyzed, the entire organization was able to be harnessed to improve customer experience.

The whole LähiTapiola organization experienced the change and as a result the ultimate starting point for the whole business is the customer life cycle and the different service needs associated at various phases. The implementation of the new service model is enabled by Benemen’s agile solution.

There has been good improvement in the management of customer contacts, but Pehkonen thinks there is still lots of potential to develop the activities - the outlook is good.

As an aside, it should be noted that those who were skeptical at first about the functionality of the new solution are now among the first to plan for wider use of Benemen's services.

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