26th  September, 2007

SECURITY AND ID CHECKING COSTS UK CONTACT CENTRE INDUSTRY £906 MILLION PER YEAR¹  

UK call centres still in the 'dark ages' when it comes to verifying customer identity

London and New York, 26th September 2007- VoiceVault today announced the findings of research conducted by ContactBabel on the use of speech technology in the contact centre as part of their '2007 UK Contact Centre Operational Review'.

ContactBabel found that the key challenge for UK businesses is how to improve customer experience while keeping confidential customer information secure and controlling their costs. Caller authentication - making sure the caller is who they say they are - is a critical part of an agent-customer interaction and vital to most contact centre operations. Typically, customers are expected to remember a PIN, password or memorable information. Assuming the customer remembers this information correctly then the procedure only takes on average 20 seconds. However, the costs associated with asking for these PINs and passwords mount up to over £900m each year across the whole UK contact centre industry.

Identity theft is becoming more a growing concern for UK consumers and according to the report "they expect to see that their private and personal information is protected by those organizations with which it is shared". This is reflected in the fact that in the twelve months since the last Operational Review was published the cost of ID checking has risen over 10% from £820m to £906m.

The report argues that a well-planned voice verification system can result in a better customer experience that eliminates the need for PINs or passwords (which were found to be universally disliked).

• Eliminating the time taken by an agent to verify a caller's identity can save 20.5p per call (over £2m per annum)*
• Secure automated identity verification enables a broader range of fully automated services to be offered
• An increase in the percentage of fully automated calls by 10% would result in agent cost savings of almost £2.9m per annum*.

The potential benefits for the business are huge but the customer also gains through a better experience, longer opening hours and greater identity protection. For procedures such as internet password resetting, the higher level of security achieved with voice verification can enable businesses to offer real-time password resets or reminders. This benefits both customer and business and, according to the report, can reduce the number of calls to helpdesks by up to 70%.

Paul Lindsey, Executive Chairman of VoiceVault, commenting on the ContactBabel, said: "The Operational Review has identified voice verification as "one of the killer applications of the next generation contact centre", and one that will certainly have more of an impact than off shoring on the UK contact centre industry. Caller authentication has been proven not only to accurately verify the identity of callers but also to dramatically improve call centre productivity and enhance customer experience. By lagging behind in adopting it, the UK call centre industry remains in the dark ages, haemorrhaging over £900 million annually."  

¹ UK Contact Centre Operational Review - ContactBabel, 2007

* Calculated based on a contact centre receiving 10 million inbound calls per annum

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About VoiceVault

VoiceVault is a specialist and leader in the provision of voice-based biometric identity verification solutions and services. With operations in the United States, United Kingdom and Ireland, the company has a global customer base of public and private organizations, such as government agencies, banks and insurers. VoiceVault is the only voice verification service certified and accredited to issue Advanced Electronic Signatures (voice digital certificates) and to be ISO 27001 rated.

VoiceVault provides a more convenient, practical and secure alternative to PINs, passwords or security tokens. As well as verifying an individual's identity over the phone or the Internet, VoiceVault can be employed across a diverse range of business applications, including procurement, payment authorization and corporate security. Organizations that deploy VoiceVault can deliver enhanced levels of service to their customers, increase security while optimizing identity verification costs. For more information, visit   www.voicevault.com .

About The UK Contact Centre Operational Review

The UK Contact Centre Operational Review (5th edition - 2007) is a study of the performance, operations, technology and HR aspects of 211 UK contact centre operations. Taking a random sample of the industry, a detailed structured questionnaire was asked to contact centre managers and directors between March and June 2007. Analysis of the results was carried out July to August 2007. ContactBabel was founded by Steve Morrell in 2000 to provide a reliable source of research, analysis and business recommendations to CRM and contact centre solution providers. Steve was formerly head of Datamonitor's global Next Generation Contact Technology division, and has written numerous reports on the future of the contact centre and CRM industries. His views have been widely quoted in The Times, the Wall Street Journal and Forbes.com, and he has presented his vision of the future at many industry events.