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OBJECTIVE:
CSF International is a developer of ATM financial transaction processing and management software. The company’s twenty employees in a Sarasota, FL call center handle inbound inquiries regarding sales and customer service. As the organization’s client base is global, CSF International wanted to ensure that its phone system allowed employees to properly record and respond to customer calls.

In addition, the company had an outdated phone system and an unreliable process of reaching employees when off-site, forcing it to depend upon pagers and incurring third-party vendor costs to direct after-hours call traffic.

CHALLENGE:
With customers worldwide, CSF International recognized the need to replace a 15 year-old phone system to offer more efficient client support and provide better phone quality, features and functionality.

When the office was closed, CSF International relied on a third-party vendor to manage and forward calls to support staff, causing the organization to incur additional costs. As a result, customers were frequently misrouted or dropped, causing frustrations in locating staff. Also, US and international customers had to use different phone numbers to reach support.

To better serve its vast client base, CSF International wanted a system that was dependable, flexible and easy to configure to meet the customers’ changing needs. Additionally, the company wanted to eliminate its third-party vendor, reduce long distance calling costs as well as streamline the process of connecting customers with the appropriate support
staff.

SOLUTION:
After evaluating several PBX offerings, CSF International selected Switchvox. Switchvox gave CSF International a complete in-house solution that was easy to install and configure. Switchvox’s solution also satisfied CSF International’s price point as it was more affordable than competitors.

Switchvox’s solution eliminated the third party vendor CSF International used for after-hours support and allowed the organization to give customers one number to call, day or night. During business hours, customer service and sales calls are directed to queues that ring all relevant staff phones. This allows for quick pickup and response and also spares customers from deciding which extension to try. After hours, the system allows the customer to call the support staff directly as if they were in the office. If for some reason the support person is unavailable, the call gets re-directed to the customer service manager.

Switchvox’s solution also gives CSF International staff the option to work from home, by assisting the employee with a remote extension, which reduces missed calls. Sales staff can travel without missing important inquiries by having the system forward their calls. If the call is not received, it bounces back to CSF International with options to re-direct to someone else or leave a voice message.

With Switchvox’s solution, companies can now afford to have a backup system on site, giving the organization the critical system backup it needs at an affordable price.

Switchvox’s system also has extensive reporting capabilities, allowing CSF International to better track customer calls and phone usage.

RESULT:
Since deploying Switchvox, CSF International has saved $200-300 monthly on long distance calling by taking advantage of Switchvox’s compatibility with SIP phones. By allowing customers to directly reach support, CSF International employees don’t have to call customers back, eliminating overseas and domestic long-distance calling costs. The company was also able to eliminate its third-party vendor for after hours customer support, eradicating another unnecessary cost.

Customer service and sales have drastically improved, as Switchvox allowed CSF International to efficiently direct calls to employees by setting up queues and sending voicemails via text message and email. Customers have even commented on the company’s new efficient means of communication.

Switchvox has also allowed CSF International employees the option to work from home with a SIP extension. Now when sales staff members are out of town, they use their SIP phone to save on long distance calls and have a direct extension to the office.


About Digium
Digium®, Inc., the Asterisk® Company, created, owns and is the innovative force behind Asterisk, the most widely used open source telephony software. Since its founding in 1999, Digium has grown to become the open source alternative to the traditional communication providers, with offerings that cost as much as 80 percent less than proprietary voice communication platforms. Digium makes Asterisk available to the open source community under the GNU General Public License (GPL) and uses business-class Asterisk to power a broad family of products for small, medium and large businesses. Digium acquired Switchvox, the leading supplier of small business phone systems based on Asterisk, in September 2007. The company’s product line also includes a wide range of hardware to enable resellers and customers to design their own voice over IP (VoIP) systems. This year alone, more than six billion minutes of calls will be made using Asterisk. More information is available at www.digium.com.

The Digium logo, Digium, Asterisk, Asterisk Business Edition, AsteriskNOW, Asterisk Appliance, Switchvox and the Asterisk logo are trademarks of Digium, Inc. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.

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