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This month Simon Banks talks to Adam Spain, Head of Customer Services at CSL Group. Adam, a customer service specialist, joined CSL in 2019 having previously worked for British Telecom and EE.
How has your previous experience helped you since you joined CSL and the secure connectivity sector?
Over the past 12 years I have led some highly successful multi-channel customer service departments, allowing me to gain a strong understanding of best practices in terms of training, motivating and developing large teams in fast-moving companies. At CSL, our 35-strong Technical Support Teams are based across our offices in London, Newbury and Rugby. Since joining, my focus has been restructuring the department, whilst implementing new processes and training programmes to ensure the highest levels of support for Installers on all the products within the CSL portfolio. As a team, we are committed to delivering on the improved service level agreements for call waiting times, email response times and customer satisfaction rates.
How important is training and development in terms of providing the highest levels of customer service?
CSL believe that it’s vital to create a team of experts. We have implemented a clear training structure to enable our entire support team to meet the expectations of our customers. We have also focused on the technical similarities within our product range to get our new starters up to speed as soon as possible. By creating levels of expertise within our teams we are allowing not only for quicker resolutions, but also for individual team members to progress through their development in a more successful and structured way.
In terms of how customer service is provided, how has this changed in recent years as technologies develop?
Today, we must acknowledge the range of ways that we can interact with and support customers. Our aim is to make it as easy as possible for our customers to contact us and for our team members to then relay the correct information for a speedy resolution. Most of the enquiries we receive today still come from ‘traditional’ channels. Our team handle over 16,000 support requests each month, with phone calls making up over 80% of these!
We are increasingly receiving support requests via email and our Live Chat application, with engineers and support staff using opportunities in the office and online to speak to our team about non-urgent queries like best practice and top tips. Last year we also launched an integration with SightCall. This App allows an engineer to stream live footage of the installation via a smart device to our team, allowing us to see what they see and ultimately find a quick resolution to any issues.
What else can we expect to see in the future?
The DualCom Pro Range, CSL Live and the My Base App provide our Installers with the tools they need to take control and manage their professional alarm signalling base. The introduction of WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger will broaden accessibility, teamed with Customer Satisfaction Scores (CSAT) to further improve our service. All of this is part of our rounded commitment to our customers, giving them support before, during and after the installation of our products. There will be more focus on proactively informing our customers on the best ways to install and overcome any field-based challenges, all without needing to make a call. However, a human voice is always there, if that’s your preference!
YOU SAID IT
“Great from CSL Group today, on the money with helping us with a new customer. Thanks for the contact this evening Rob Evans.”
Carl Meason (Fenix Monitoring) – LinkedIn Post – 6 January
