Tek-Tips is the largest IT community on the Internet today!
Members share and learn making Tek-Tips Forums the best source of peer-reviewed technical information on the Internet!
-
Congratulations strongm on being selected by the Tek-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!
Auto Attendant with voice recognition 2
- Thread starter TXGeoff
- Start date
Infinity306
IS-IT--Management
Yes, Don't do it.. Stay away, speaking from a users standpoint, Voice Recognition is the worst. I'd rather just listen and hit the corresponding numbers until I am connected to a human or where I need to be routed. I work in a semi noisy office, with Servers and other employees, and on all the Voice Recognition systems I've Encountered I end up taking at least twice as long to go through the menus due to the AA continually asking me to repeat because it picked up a noise and didn't recognize what it was supposed to be.. and I doubt this was just a lowend Voice recognition system, since it was at Hewlett Packard support the last time i encountered a Voice Recognition system(about a week ago).
amriddle01
Programmer
They are just emperors new clothes, how is looking like an idiot saying yes repeatedly and loudly any quicker or better than pressing a button? I bloody hate them, try Lloyd/TSB telephone banking and see how long before you slam the phone through the desk. lol
ACS - IP Office Implement
"I'm just off to Hartlepool to buy some exploding trousers
ACS - IP Office Implement
"I'm just off to Hartlepool to buy some exploding trousers
-
2
- #4
AA: "Thank you for calling XYZ company please say the name of the option you want"
ME: "Sales"
AA: "Did you say bells?"
ME: "NO"
AA: "Ok let's try again. Please say the name of the option you want"
ME: "Sales Department!"
AA: "Did you say smells compartment?"
ME: "NO!"
AA: "Ok let's try again. Please say the name of the option you want"
ME: "Operator!"
AA: "Did you say popcorn maker?"
ME: "NO DAMN YOU I WANT THE OPERATOR!"
AA: "Did you say I want a sex change operation?"
Now imagine having customers with different accents, inflections, dialects and try to have the system recognize what they are saying.
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
ME: "Sales"
AA: "Did you say bells?"
ME: "NO"
AA: "Ok let's try again. Please say the name of the option you want"
ME: "Sales Department!"
AA: "Did you say smells compartment?"
ME: "NO!"
AA: "Ok let's try again. Please say the name of the option you want"
ME: "Operator!"
AA: "Did you say popcorn maker?"
ME: "NO DAMN YOU I WANT THE OPERATOR!"
AA: "Did you say I want a sex change operation?"
Now imagine having customers with different accents, inflections, dialects and try to have the system recognize what they are saying.
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
- Thread starter
- #5
Guys,
I feel as strongly as you do about AA runaround, but the decision has been made to not replace our receptionist who just left after 9 years. Our clients are stunned to get an AA, most hate the dial by name directory, and many of them can't see well enough to find the right letters on the phone keypad even if they do get that far.
VR may not be perfect but it's gotten a LOT better than it was before. I just called Nuance and dealt with their Speech Attendant. I asked for Sales and got Sales. I asked for Enterprise Products and got there. I provided the region I was from and got transferred successfully, so it's not all bad. I have no illusions that VR will be perfect, but from a customer service standpoint we're already disappointing our clients with existing AA and dial-by-name.
Short of having a human answer the phone I need to present the best possible alternative(s) to management. Judging from the responses I've seen so far, many of you would dismiss VR based on bad experience with someone else's solution. I'm not ready to rule it out quite that quickly without investigating what's available today, and piloting some of the products to see if they work in real life.
So back to my original question, is anyone out there actually *using* any of these products?
Geoff
I feel as strongly as you do about AA runaround, but the decision has been made to not replace our receptionist who just left after 9 years. Our clients are stunned to get an AA, most hate the dial by name directory, and many of them can't see well enough to find the right letters on the phone keypad even if they do get that far.
VR may not be perfect but it's gotten a LOT better than it was before. I just called Nuance and dealt with their Speech Attendant. I asked for Sales and got Sales. I asked for Enterprise Products and got there. I provided the region I was from and got transferred successfully, so it's not all bad. I have no illusions that VR will be perfect, but from a customer service standpoint we're already disappointing our clients with existing AA and dial-by-name.
Short of having a human answer the phone I need to present the best possible alternative(s) to management. Judging from the responses I've seen so far, many of you would dismiss VR based on bad experience with someone else's solution. I'm not ready to rule it out quite that quickly without investigating what's available today, and piloting some of the products to see if they work in real life.
So back to my original question, is anyone out there actually *using* any of these products?
Geoff
Infinity306
IS-IT--Management
see if you can find 1 that will allow callers to hit a key to switch from IVR to touchtones, In IVR breakouts are always a good thing just have it open with a prompt to hit a key to go to normal AA. In Noisy caller environments even the best IVR will fail..
I'm simply saying based on the past several Microsoft UM installations I've done with IP Office that the VR is terrible. I'd give it 70% accuracy at best based on real world experience with callers from different regions trying to use the system. Want to reach John Smith and your in good shape, try to reach Kirsty Baughman and then what...it is Chris-T or Curse-T, it is Bow-man or Baa-man, the VR has no idea and the caller is likely to pronouce it wrong anyway.
Then to top it off your trying to have elderly people use this thing, oh dear lord talk about confused (or maybe they are just blind, couldn't tell by your comment).
If they are indeed elderly I would watch this and expect this to be the experience your callers will have with a VR system:
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
Then to top it off your trying to have elderly people use this thing, oh dear lord talk about confused (or maybe they are just blind, couldn't tell by your comment).
If they are indeed elderly I would watch this and expect this to be the experience your callers will have with a VR system:
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
- Thread starter
- #10
Thanks Kyle, and that's actually the kind of advice I was looking for, i.e. avoid MS UM for VR.
I'm focused more on dedicated VR vendors - Nuance, SpeechSwitch, and any others that may be out there - who provide Enterprise-class VR, not "and it does VR too" providers like MS. Maybe that's why our perceptions about usability are so different.
As I mentioned, I've had pretty good success recently with high-end, speaker-independent VR, especially when you can limit the "vocabulary" and the VR system is context aware, knowing what responses are reasonable or possible given the call flow.
As for pronunciation of names, again, the dedicated vendors seem to be keenly aware of these problems. SpeechSwitch, for example, provides a phonetic editor for a username, so you can help the system deal with names like Nguyen.
I suspect there aren't a lot of folks choosing IP Office that are willing to spend the money for high-end VR. We are, and in retrospect, I'm probably fishing in the wrong pond asking this question here. But thanks for your thoughts!
Geoff
I'm focused more on dedicated VR vendors - Nuance, SpeechSwitch, and any others that may be out there - who provide Enterprise-class VR, not "and it does VR too" providers like MS. Maybe that's why our perceptions about usability are so different.
As I mentioned, I've had pretty good success recently with high-end, speaker-independent VR, especially when you can limit the "vocabulary" and the VR system is context aware, knowing what responses are reasonable or possible given the call flow.
As for pronunciation of names, again, the dedicated vendors seem to be keenly aware of these problems. SpeechSwitch, for example, provides a phonetic editor for a username, so you can help the system deal with names like Nguyen.
I suspect there aren't a lot of folks choosing IP Office that are willing to spend the money for high-end VR. We are, and in retrospect, I'm probably fishing in the wrong pond asking this question here. But thanks for your thoughts!
Geoff
Even Avaya took the VR off of their support number a while back here in the US. I suppose enough people complained that they asked for a support option and got directed to the wrong place. I can't tell you the number of times I called into ATAC and asked via the VR for IP Office and got the CM group or IP phone group.
I like your example of Nguyen (win), but you would have to create a phonetic entry for "in-jew-why-en", "ne-gooey-en", "na-goo-win", "in-gee-you-ee-in", etc. One name is pronounced dozens of different ways by callers. Heck even Avaya is "ah-vay-ah", "aye-vay-ah" and "a-veye-ya"
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
I like your example of Nguyen (win), but you would have to create a phonetic entry for "in-jew-why-en", "ne-gooey-en", "na-goo-win", "in-gee-you-ee-in", etc. One name is pronounced dozens of different ways by callers. Heck even Avaya is "ah-vay-ah", "aye-vay-ah" and "a-veye-ya"
Kyle Holladay
ACA-I, ACA Call Center, ACS-I, ACS-M, TIA-CTP, MCP/MCTS Exchange 2007
ACE Implement: IP Office
"Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it." - Henry Ford
Infinity306
IS-IT--Management
I believe i saw in a Press Release that HP's solution is speechswitch.
another video to consider
another video to consider
Infinity306
IS-IT--Management
The only reason I would consider IVR if if my boss forced me to after my objections and concerns.. High-end or Low-end.. which I guess is the position you are in.. you just can't replace a local human employee for Voice recognition/Conversation presently..Choose to have a receptionist that answers every call or an AA.. Probaly even a Minimum wage employee to answer the phones would beat even the high-end Voice recognition systems right now.. you also have to recognise that most of the people here are going by their experiences with IVR and most do not work in a soundproof/quiet office and have background noise that tends to mess with most IVR systems out there..
- Status
Similar threads
- Locked
- Question