CALL CENTERS (CENTRES) - Faculty of Industrial Engineering and ...

support. Providing that support is difficult without defining the service that the Help Desk can
reasonably provide. Service level agreements are being developed with other ITS work groups
to define relationships and responsibilities. Increased satisfaction also leads to an increase in
volume of calls and makes it difficult for the Help Desk to balance walk-in, e-mail, and phone
support. Implementation of an automatic call distribution system has helped manage phone
traffic and improved the working environment for staff. In addition, a virtual help desk project
involving several campuses within the North Dakota University System is exploring help desk
software as a means of sharing knowledge between campuses.
Keywords: University help desk, Practical strategies, Customer service, Campus, ITS Help Desk,
Customer needs, Problem management process, Customer satisfaction, Service level agreements,
ITS work groups, E-mail, Phone support, Automatic call distribution system, Phone traffic,
Working environment, Virtual help desk project, North Dakota University System, Help desk
software
16. Van Dijk, N.M. Why queuing never vanishes, European Journal of Operational Research, 99 (2),
1997, 463–476.
Abstract. This tutorial aims to address and illustrate that queuing theory has a wider potential
than generally perceived, while at the same time a variety of practical problems, both
in daily-life and industry, are open for fundamental research. To this end, it will: (i) Highlight
basic queuing insights for daily-life purposes. (ii) Provide exact and bounding results for queuing
network applications. (iii) Present a number of practical illustrations (case studies) taken from
areas as: Daily-life situations (postal offices and supermarkets); Transportation (railways and
air traffic); Administrative logistics (reengineering); Telecommunications (call-centers).
Keywords: Queuing theory, Daily life, Industry, Bounding results, Exact results, Queuing network,
Postal offices, Supermarkets, Transportation, Railways, Air traffic, Administrative logistics,
Reengineering, Telecommunications, Call centers
17. Bielski, L. Building a bridge to the customer [bank call centres], ABA Banking Journal, 90 (12),
1998, 46–48.
Abstract. In the brave new world of bank call centers, what’s possible, what’s probable, and
what progressive banks have in mind for these facilities isn’t always the same. What can be done
to better match plan and performance? The push to transform the call center into a vehicle for
sales is a relatively recent one, but providing retail banking solutions is fast becoming a red hot
industry. Although disagreements centering on the hard facts of integration continue, everyone
in CTI agrees that the one-to-one marketing model makes all the sense in the world.
Keywords: Bank call centers, Sales, Retail banking, Computer telephony integration, Customer
service
18. Tax, Stephen S. and Stephen W. Brown. Recovering and learning from service failure, Sloan
Management Review, 40 (1), 1998, 75–89.
Abstract. Effective service recovery is vital to maintaining customer and employee satisfaction
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