SIEMENS TECHNOLOGY HELPING TO CUT 140 BILLION OF CONSUMER CREDIT

Siemens HiPath ProCenter is at the heart of the Government and Finance Sector-funded National Debtline (NDL) - the free, confidential helpline that provides advice on debt and money management.

Siemens HiPath ProCenter is at the heart of the Government and Finance Sector-funded National Debtline (NDL) - the free, confidential helpline that provides advice on debt and money management.

Consumer credit stood at 140 billion in 2001 and debt related problems affect thousand in the UK alone. NDL provides valuable support to those affected by debt by making financial advice easily available via the phone. Funding has come from the Government and the banking and credit industry, and The Money Advice Trust - the UK's only charity to co-ordinate free, independent money advice to those in serious debt - has delivered the 12 month pilot which aims to help 50,000 people by February 2003.

After winning the tender Siemens Communications tailor-made a solution. HiPath ProCenter delivers the incoming calls to the most appropriate member of the NDL team who is able to access information through a specially designed debt management application. The pilot project's future depends on its success, and Siemens has designed the solution so that progress can be monitored and information can be provided which allows continuous project assessment. The solution also extends to the NDL website which increases the availability of the advice and information.

NDL Chief Executive, Paul Mullins, said: "We chose Siemens because they were prepared to design a solution that would meet our needs exactly and felt that they really understood what we wanted to achieve."

"Obviously a big part of the operation is taking the calls and ensuring that people are put through to advisors that can help them with their specific problem. Our main centre is in Birmingham, but to assess whether one national centre is better than a local service we also set up an office in Fife to handle local enquiries."

Using skills-based routing the solution matches callers with advisors and the Fife office receives all the calls that originate from the surrounding area. The skills based routing software provides reports that show how advisors are spending their time and what type of advice people are looking for. Callers can, if they wish, remain anonymous - something which is very important when dealing with subjects such as debt - and this extends to there being no 'caller display' and NDL's own number not registering on the BT 1471 service.
                           
Paul added: "We don't refer to ourselves as a call centre because debt is a very complex issue and advisors don't follow a script but use their training and skills. The data base system is very valuable to us, we need to capture data so we can assess the pilot, but we also need a system which allows us to share expertise amongst the advisors and improve our service."

Siemens worked with partner PayPlan to design the debt management software and the data base system. This has a self-learning facility which ranks questions and information according to usefulness and can help guide advisors as to the types of question they should be asking. PayPlan was also responsible for developing the website.

Through its Advanced Customer Solutions (ACS) Siemens offers one of the most comprehensive portfolios of Contact Centre, CRM and Mobile Business services available in the UK. ACS solutions comprise state-of-the-art and award-winning technologies in combination with a comprehensive suite of professional services. Solutions are tailored to meet the needs of both public and private sector organisations and are delivered in conjunction with technical design, implementation, training and lifelong support.

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