CallCoordinator is a CICS application for the IBM OS/390 operating system on a host computer. CallCoordinator combines the capabilities of CICS® on the host with the capabilities of a private branch exchange (PBX) or switch.
CallCoordinator offers many benefits to your work groups and call centers, enabling integration of your telephone system with new and existing computer applications.
CallCoordinator is a product that combines telephony and computer services for call centers. CallCoordinator gives business information to a call center agent on the agent's terminal in response to a call.
Figure 1. Agent and customer meet across computers and switches.
CallCoordinator call management features improve a call center's productivity.
CallCoordinator is designed for any business that uses telephones and computer applications to conduct business with their customers, including help desk support for employees. The person who uses CallCoordinator in a call center might be an agent, a service representative, or a customer support representative.
CallCoordinator runs on CICS on the IBM OS/390 operating system on a host computer.
Your telephone service can be provided by a telephone system such as a private branch exchange (PBX). CallCoordinator coordinates telephony activity from a supported switch with your business applications that run under CICS on a host computer.
CallCoordinator accesses supported switches through CallPath/CICS. CallPath SwitchServer/2 converts the signals that CallPath/CICS sends between the telephone system and the host computer.
Call centers today use two separate technologies: voice and data.
Voice technology, as described in this book, consists of:
Data technology, as described in this book, consists of:
Voice (telephony) people are concerned with call holding time, queue lengths, call routing, overflow, statistics and reports, and real time. Data people are concerned with online transactions, response time, availability, data integrity, and network management.
And what integrates voice and data? CallCoordinator.
Figure 2. CallCoordinator integrates voice and data.
CallCoordinator call management facilities can automatically start a business application transaction for agents who handle incoming and outgoing calls and use a computer to conduct business. It can manage the call load so it is evenly balanced between groups. Also, it allows agents to make conference and consultation calls while viewing the same business application transaction.
Your agents today might use both a telephone (connected to a switch) and a terminal (connected to the host computer). While helping customers on the telephone, they must access information on their computer terminal before they can complete a business transaction. They need to get information from the computer or change the customer's record in the computer as a result of the conversation. But it takes the agent's time to access the transaction.
CallCoordinator automates the process of accessing the information the agent needs, letting the agent concentrate on helping the customer. Agents can handle more customers, making the call center more productive.
Figure 3. CallCoordinator joins the separate worlds of the switch and the computer.
CallCoordinator links the separate worlds of voice and data processing, for a whole new world of possibilities. It synchronizes telephony switching with data access to display a business application panel on the terminal screen with the telephone call. It automatically starts the correct business application transaction at an agent's terminal for agents who handle calls and who use a computer to conduct business.
The call with its business application can be transferred to another agent, either for consultation or for more efficient use of specialty agents. CallCoordinator collects information about the call, whether incoming or outgoing, so that you can analyze and improve your productivity and effectiveness.
CallCoordinator can help you meet a number of important objectives for your call center:
CallCoordinator improves customer service by providing:
Moreover, CallCoordinator collects detailed call and agent data that can be used for reports. You can use the reports to analyze your service and determine how best to increase efficiency and customer satisfaction.
When you give better customer service, you save money because:
CallCoordinator increases agent productivity by saving agents' time in dialing, accessing transactions, and entering data. Because CallCoordinator can transfer a call with the associated CICS application transaction, more experienced agents can complete a transaction begun by a new agent or train the new agent more effectively on the job.
CallCoordinator also increases agent productivity by providing access to optional network services, such as Dialed Number Identification Service (DNIS) and Automatic Number Identification (ANI) service.
CallPath/CICS, an IBM CallPath Services Architecture product, interfaces with a growing number of supported switches from different vendors through CallPath SwitchServer/2. Your call center can evolve as IBM's CallPath Services Architecture evolves. CallPath Services Architecture protects today's and tomorrow's telephony investment.
You can use your existing business applications and integrate them with CallCoordinator for easy application development. Your programmers can access CallCoordinator functions from your existing business application programs using CallCoordinator application program interfaces (APIs). With APIs, configuration tables, and exits, you have the flexibility to customize CallCoordinator to your unique business requirements as they change.
The call management feature of CallCoordinator can identify which department a caller wants to reach and what business transaction each agent needs with an incoming call. So along with an incoming call, an agent sees a panel for the business application used by that agent's department. This is CallCoordinator's Intelligent Answering feature. The agent can respond immediately to the customer's question, because the business application panel the agent needs is already on the terminal screen. If ANI information is provided with the call, the transaction can include specific customer data.
If an agent is unable to complete the business transaction alone, the agent can do one of the following:
To help you use your automatic call distribution (ACD) staff more effectively, CallCoordinator provides the Transfer Load Balancing feature. With this feature, your ACD groups -- no matter where they are located -- can backup each other. For example, if your New York staff's calls peak midday, but they still need a lunch break, your staff in another time zone can take some of the calls. That way, you don't need to hire more people just to cover a busy 2-hour time.
If you use statistics from your switch for analyzing your customer service or for planning, you'll want to use CallCoordinator's Data Collection for Reports feature. You can use the telephony events that are collected together with any data from your computer transactions to analyze information you can't get from your switch alone.
Chapter 2, "What Call Management Does" describes the primary features:
With CallCoordinator call management you have the following capabilities:
You can use CallCoordinator features as they are delivered, or you can customize CallCoordinator to work differently to meet your unique needs. Customization can be as simple as selecting options on a CallCoordinator panel or entering site-specific information on a CallCoordinator configuration panel. More complex customization is simplified by using application program interfaces (APIs) or exits.
Your application programmers can use CallCoordinator APIs to invoke CallCoordinator functions within your own business applications. Exits allow you to invoke your own routines.
APIs give you the flexibility to use CallCoordinator in a way that fits your unique business needs. APIs will be maintained in future releases of CallCoordinator, so you won't need to modify your business application programs with each release of CallCoordinator. There are many APIs for widely differing purposes, for example:
CallCoordinator system administration is organized around easy-to-use panels that control:
The CallPath CallCoordinator/CICS System Management Guide gives task-oriented instructions for the CallCoordinator system administrator.
Anyone accessing CallCoordinator panels can find an online explanation of the fields, panels, and messages by pressing the F1 (Help) key.
Three types of online help are available:
You might want to install CallCoordinator in the same CICS region as your business application for SRO.
Or, you might want CallCoordinator to run in one region and your business application or terminals in another for MRO.
Or, you might want CallCoordinator to run in multiple regions to take advantage of the sysplex environment.
Your CICS system programmer can refer to the CallPath CallCoordinator/CICS System Management Guide for more information about SRO, MRO, and parallel sysplex.
CallCoordinator software code follows IBM standards to offer your agents panels and procedures that are familiar, clear, and easy to use.
Specifically, this means that the panels are designed to conform to the Systems Application Architecture® (SAA®) Common User Access® (CUA®) basic interface for software applications developed to run on nonprogrammable terminals (NPTs) in the SAA operating environments on IBM S/390 with CICS for OS/390. Your CICS programmers will be familiar with the system and programming methods they need to use for CallCoordinator.
If you have invested in Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) or Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, you can use them with CallCoordinator to enhance their functionality.
ACD is a feature on many switches that processes and controls a high volume of incoming calls. ACD distributes calls to agents based on agent waiting time or other algorithms. With ACD, calls can be assigned priorities. When agents are busy, ACD can be configured to provide callers with recorded announcements, music, immediate transfer to other agents, or transfer to off-site locations.
If you have ACD, you can increase its use across a network of switches with the CallCoordinator Transfer Load Balancing feature (see "Transfer Load Balancing Feature"). Also, you can use the pilot number for an ACD group as a basis for Intelligent Answering (see "Using Pilot Numbers").
If your ACD supports Host-based routing (trigger), you can redirect a call using intelligence in your CICS application.
An IVR can provide 24-hour, 7-day-a-week access to information. Many installations find that an IVR can handle about one-third of their calls. By providing off-hour service and taking a portion of the agents' calls during regular business hours, IVRs offer better service and reduced labor costs.
IBM has various voice processing platforms that you can use to solve call processing problems. For information on IBM IVRs, contact your IBM marketing or support representative. CallCoordinator can work with IVRs from other vendors.
The IVR can answer the telephone, greet the caller, and prompt the caller to use the telephone keypad to enter the caller's account number or a code for the service needed. Then, reading from application transactions, the IVR can give audio information to the caller. Using CallCoordinator, the IVR can then transfer the caller to an agent. The agent has access to the same or even a different transaction for that caller, depending on the needs of the caller and how CallCoordinator is set up in your call center.
CallCoordinator and an IVR can do for a call center what automated teller machines do for banks. Customers can call 24 hours a day, but you don't need to staff through the night. Callers can get current information from the computer. Then, if they need to speak to one of your agents, they can be transferred to an agent in another time zone (see "Transfer Load Balancing Feature").
Figure 4. With CallCoordinator and an IVR, customers can get service 24 hours a day.
During regular business hours, the IVR -- instead of an agent -- can transfer a caller to an agent or an ACD group. The agent receiving the transferred call also gets the transaction and any information the caller entered at the IVR's prompt. The agent does not need to type in the caller's account number.
In many instances, customers prefer the privacy of interacting with a machine rather than a person. Some customers prefer that a recording, not a person, tell them how much the price of their favorite stock changed in one day or how much their balance is. Also, by entering their personal information silently on the telephone keypad, they will not be overheard by others nearby. With CallCoordinator, the privacy that the IVR offers continues even when the caller transfers to an agent; this is because the agent sees the information immediately and doesn't need to ask the caller to repeat any personal information.
CallCoordinator uses two CallPath Services Architecture products:
This product runs under CICS and OS/390 on the host computer.
Together, CallPath SwitchServer/2, CallPath/CICS, and CallCoordinator coordinate switch activity with computer processing to start the business application transaction the agent needs while handling a call.
CallCoordinator uses the CallPath/CICS API to request actions and to recognize telephone call-progress events, such as call arrivals, transfers, and disconnects. This way, CallCoordinator can coordinate the start or transfer of your business application transaction with a telephone call.
For example, CallCoordinator can request an action from the switch, such as transferring a call. Figure 5 shows a simplified view of the call sequence.
Figure 5. The host computer sends requests to the switch and the switch responds.
