February the 12th 2008, the Speech Technology Workgroup from the Belgian contact centers association ContactCentres.be, brought the speech technology professionals together at the time of the seminar “Speech Applications: Customer Experience in Belgium”. The event was held in the Belgacom premises, sponsored by the key technology providers main of the Belgian market: Acapela, DB Scape, Genesys, NextiraOne, Nuance, Quentris and and the Ring-ring Company.

To introduce the event, Tom Houwing, Voice User Interface expert, undertook to draw up the current trends of the market. Then, Catherine De Baets (Belgacom call center), explained the improvement of the Customer Care. Jean-Michel Motte (BeTV), presented the recent use of text-to-speech synthesis for movies ordering by phone. On its side, Leroy Merlin decided to refresh its technical assistance IVR in 2006 which purpose is to assist the customer before, during and after their purchase process, thanks to the advises of 25 former craftsmen (“sell better and sell more”). 

Valerie Nève, Manager of the Contact Center of Leroy Merlin, told that the new IVR allows the agents to be better devoted to their mission by releasing them from routine calls now treated in self-service (general and personal information about stores, services, the loyalty card…). The IVR is interfaced with a CRM solution for a personalized attendance of each customer. Call-back appointments are proposed automatically in overflow period. The statistical reports provided by VocaBase are a precious tool for the evaluation of each proposed service, and allows the continuous improvement of the service.

 
After the break, Guido Vermeire, (Belgacom Directory Assistance), gave us an information update on LISA, Belgacom’s fully automated directory assistance service, reachable in Belgium to the 1234 since 2004. The last conference made by Hans van Hauteghem (RMI) talked about the text-to-speech synthesis, nowadays largely used in the weather forecast information service by phone.

To close the event, Tom Houwing animated an improvised debate between the audience, Alain Rondenbosch (director of Speech Technology Workgroup) and Vincent Vandenbossche (director of ContactCentres.be). It reveals that the speech technology professionals want to share their experience, whether they are end users, integrators, suppliers… The Speech Technology Workgroup is committed gathering each year the main actors of the market. See you soon!