Case Study: Psytechnics Helps Friends Provident With Voice Performance Management

“When the IPT system was only part deployed, we became very aware of the difference between quality of experience (QoE) and quality of service (QoS),” Sharratt continues. “A small proportion of our call center staff were not satisfied with the call quality when using the IP telephony service, due to a number of factors including varying volume levels, or an echo or hiss on the line. We instinctively knew that if we wanted to offer the best possible service, we needed to manage voice performance, as well as check whether the IP telephony network was operating correctly,” he says.

“We purchased numerous quality of service tools, all of which indicated that our IP telephony system was working. None of the tools could explain the mystery behind the small number of call quality issues that we were experiencing,” continues Sharratt. “We needed a tool to identify phone call experiences of customers as well as check the network infrastructure was working.”

Solution

With a need to measure quality of experience as well as quality of service, Sharratt turned to Psytechnics, having followed the company’s spin out from BT in 2000.

“I was aware of the research the company had carried out into measuring customer quality of experience, when making phone calls over an IP telephony system. Psytechnics suggested Experience Manager, which manages voice performance in addition to measuring regular QoS,” says Sharratt. “Experience Manager can tell instantly if a customer has a poor quality telephone connection and pinpoint the cause of the problem. The software is proactive in flagging any disruption to call quality and is focused on ensuring a positive phone call experience.”

Friends Provident started working with Psytechnics in November 2006, initially agreeing on metrics to measure end-user experience. The company opted to trial Experience Manager for one month, measuring the quality of experience on phone calls made to a Model Office setup to accept ‘Live’ calls during the new Contact Center Trial.

“The trial was successful, in that it really allowed us to instantly identify any drop in call quality that our regular quality of service tools did not recognize. At the same time, we were also looking at IBM Tivoli Netcool to provide an enterprise management platform. The fact that Psytechnics complimented Netcool and also integrated so well into our existing telephone infrastructure was another positive point,” says Sharratt.