‘Perfect Partnership’ Delivers IVR with Intelligent,Personalised Call Steering and Self-Service to Belgium’s bpost

Belfast, 29 April, 2013 – Leader in phone-based and mobile customer service, SpeechStorm, in co-operation with Genesys and NextiraOne, has completed the implementation of a new Interactive Voice Response (IVR) solution for bpost (Belgian Post Group) at their Centre Monnaie HQ in Brussels.

The flexible new IVR implementation of SpeechStorm, re-sold by Genesys as ‘Conversation Manager Applications, powered by SpeechStorm’, was successfully integrated into the current contact centre infrastructure by NextiraOne. It will enable bpost to respond quickly to changing business needs and guide customers more efficiently through their inbound contact-centre calls by routing them to best suit each individual customer’s needs.

One of the largest civilian employers in Belgium, bpost provides a wide range of services across postal and financial services and the new IVR will be experienced by the company’s residential customers and those of bpost bank.

The implementation was completed in six weeks and was live at the start of February. The SpeechStorm application replaced a less flexible bespoke, IVR installation, previously requiring a technically complex, time consuming and costly ‘change’ process before the solution could then, itself, be adapted, technically, to meet new business demands. This latest application, however, makes it much easier for corporate users to adapt the IVR system themselves without involving IT departments and other resources.

“bpost needed the deployment of a flexible IVR solution to enable our businesses to respond quickly to changing needs, and to inform customers immediately of well-known circumstances impacting bpost’s service. At the same time, we want a smart tool to further develop intelligent call steering and self-service functionality, providing a customer experience that we could fully understand, and manage,” said Jan Smets, Director of Marketing & Customer Service, bpost.

“Not only did SpeechStorm, Genesys and NextiraOne Belgium successfully deploy the solution within six weeks,” Smets added, “but they also exceeded our expectations in terms of the support and commitment that was shown. We now have business users building personalised customer service applications and pitching those into other parts of the business in rapid time. Less restricted by technology and process, we can now start to think differently about real-time personalisation and improvement to customer interactions.”

Oliver Lennon, CEO, SpeechStorm, commented, “We are delighted that bpost is already seeing the benefits of implementing our software. Many businesses still have inflexible and static IVR development tools at the heart of their customer interactions. Changes to such solutions can be complex, costly, time consuming and involve high risk. The situation is often compounded by limited, or no, IVR reporting, which means that they end up providing poor customer experience.

“With SpeechStorm at the heart of its new IVR, bpost’s customers will be treated to a new, intelligent interaction with their ‘service provider’, and their experience will, without doubt, make their everyday lives that much easier. Like other customers using our software, we are confident this will lead to greater satisfaction and, ultimately, increased loyalty and retention.”

Notes for Editors
About Genesys Conversation Manager Applications
Genesys Conversation Manager Applications, powered by SpeechStorm, enable a whole new approach to the design and management of self-service applications, providing rapid delivery, instant changes and unlimited flexibility, allowing customers to deliver an individually-tailored experience on every call.
Genesys Conversation Manager Applications enable:
• rapid deployment of personalized, dynamic IVR with 70% less effort than traditional development approaches
• real-time performance management and instant changes to call-flows and prompts
• increased automation.
Genesys Conversation Manager Applications are compatible with GVP 7.6 and GVP 8.1 and can be used in conjunction with existing VoiceXML applications.

About SpeechStorm – www.speechstorm.com
SpeechStorm® helps organisations of all sizes make everyday tasks easier for their customers. We provide pre-built IVR, speech self-service and mobile apps that reduce waiting times for customers and reduce call handling times in the contact centre. Our solutions are quick to implement and easy to manage, putting the business in control of the customer experience.

About bpost – www.bpost.be
bpost is the leading postal operator in Belgium, marketing a wide range of products and services on mail and related markets. bpost’s core business is collecting, sorting, transporting and delivering letters and parcels. Every day, bpost staff handle 12 million mail items and drop by every single letterbox in Belgium.
bpost also develops activities responding to the interaction between electronic communication and mail. bpost and its subsidiaries provide solutions in document management, international added value services and more. Services are provided to business under the name bpost business. International activities are operated under the name bpost international.
bpost bank/bpost banque, a joint venture of bpost and BNP Paribas Fortis, markets a range of banking and insurance products.
The Belgian State holds 50% + 1 share of bpost. The remaining shares are held by CVC Capital Partners.

About Genesys – www.genesyslab.com
Genesys is the leading provider of customer service and contact centre software and services — with a 100% focus on customer experience and mission to Save the World from Bad Customer Service. With more than 2,000 customers in 80 countries, Genesys is uniquely positioned to help companies bring their people, insights and customer channels together to drive today’s new customer conversation. Genesys software directs more than 100 million interactions every day from the contact centre to the back office, helping companies deliver fast, simple service and a highly personalized cross-channel customer experience. Genesys software also optimizes processes and the performance of customer-facing employees across the enterprise.

About NextiraOne - www.nextiraone.eu/be
NextiraOne is a European multinational company that designs, installs, maintains and supports business solutions and communications services for over 60,000 private and Public Sector customers. Using its expertise in leading-edge communications, including data centres, contact centres, unified communications, secure network infrastructures and managed services, NextiraOne helps its customers to transform their organisations, making the complex simple.
Headquartered in Paris, NextiraOne has a direct sales and service presence in 16 countries with more than 4,300 employees across Europe and the USA, including 2,500 qualified service experts, and an annual revenue totalling around one billion euros in 2012.




For more information, please contact:
Damian Kelly,
VP Sales & Marketing,
SpeechStorm Limited,
Elmwood Exchange,
90, Lisburn Road,
Belfast.
BT9 6AG
Tel: +44 28 9094 3100
E: d.kelly@speechstorm.com

For SpeechStorm media and analyst enquiries, please contact:








For bpost media enquiries, please contact:
Press Office,
Centre Monnaie,
14th Floor,
1000 Bruxelles.
Tel. +32 2 276 21 84
E: servicepresse@bpost.be, or press.relations@bpost.be

For Genesys media enquiries, please contact:
Claire Grant,
IBA International – PR for Genesys.
Tel: +44 (0)1780 721433
E: cgrant@iba-international.com

For NextiraOne media enquiries, please contact:
Ingrid De Keyser,
Marcom Manager.
Tel: +32 (0) 2 7188409
E: Ingrid.de-keyser@nextiraone.eu

Contact Information

Tim Guest,

Managing Partner,

ATROPOS Communications.

(44) (0)7956 257069

tim.guest@atropospr.com