How to effectively build a call center on a Norstar phone system

For those of you business owners out there who have are considering building or rebuilding a call center for your Norstar phone system, this article is for you.

First, lets make sure we are clear on what a call center is.

Sometimes it's called a Call Center, sometimes its called an ACD, or Que. Really, it's all of them.

A "Call Center" is the process of having many agents take phone calls that are brought in in order.

An "ACD" is an Automatic Call Distribution system. The ACD delivers calls to agents as they become available in the order they received, or the order they were put in the QUE.

The call center or ACD system performs a couple of functions. It keeps track of the order of the calls. It keeps track of which agent is logged in and whether or not they available. It plays a message to your client on hold every so often to let them know you are alive and it can produce reports about all of these things.

Really it's very simple and ingenous The ACD "system" only touch's the call when reading a on hold message or prompt and when delivering the call to an agent.

SO THEN, how about that Norstar phone system.

Well, back in the day, you used to have use what was known as an Application Module. It was a computer in a box the size of an 824 or Modular ICS phone system. You would then load up the Cintech made call center software, connect it to your phone system and off you went.

These days it's a little different. Nortel has killed it's contract with Cintech and they have ceased making the application module. They did this because they have a NEW solution.

The Call Pilot voicemail's for Norstar, the Call Pilot 100 and the Call Pilot 150 both have the ability to install the new Nortel made call center software.

There area few differences between the call pilot 100 and the 150.

The 100 is a 4 port model and the 150 is an 8 port machine. (meaning the number of simultaneous connections that can be made to it)

The 100 will only go up to 40 mailboxes as a voicemail unit and only 10 agents in at a time call center. Both the voicemail and the ACD share the same 4 ports.

The 150 will go to 300 voicemail boxes, 10 agents at a time with the basic call center and up to 80 agents with the call center PRO or enhanced. Nifty.

So how then do you do this effectively.

Let's break this into 3 categories.

1) Small call center -- Individual ques for one or two people or 10 agents or less.
2) Medium duty call center, 10 agents or less, full time
3) Heavy duty call center, 10 agents and up, full time.

The way to start, if you need a small call center is to simply use the call pilot 100 or the call pilot 150 base call center and only have one unit.

If 4 ports works, then the 100 is an ideal choice. If you need the 8 ports due to heavier call volume, then the 150 does great.

If you outgrow the 150 base call center, you can then upgrade to the enhanced call center and add more agents.

If you outgrow the single call pilot 150, you can add a SECOND call pilot 150 and use one for your voicemail unit and one for your call center. In this configuration, you can add up to 80 agents for a much more robust call center.

If you outgrow the 8 ports, Nortel really wants you to jump to their Option 11 Meridian style PBX's, but a use application mod might be the trick.

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