| Patent Number |
Title Of Patent |
Date Issued |
| 7035927 |
Intelligent inbound/outbound communications blending |
April 25, 2006 |
| In a blended inbound/outbound call center (100), an outbound call-pacing function (122) decides whether or not to initiate an additional outbound call for a particular skill. It determines (206) whether the number of available agents for the skill plus the number of resting agents for th |
| 6999579 |
Method and apparatus for the efficient utilization of trunk bandwidth in a global enterprise |
February 14, 2006 |
| The present invention relates to the operation of interconnected switches or call centers. In particular, the present invention allows communication bandwidth to be conserved, by providing audible feedback from a switch that is relatively local to a caller, even though a call center |
| 6947543 |
Computer-telephony integration that uses features of an automatic call distribution system |
September 20, 2005 |
| In a computer-telephony integrated (CTI) contact center, a CTI adjunct (160) enqueues contacts in contact queues (184) of the CTI adjunct, but also causes contacts that are calls (168) to be enqueued as ACD calls in ACD call queues (120) of an ACD system (101), whereby the ACD system and |
| 6839419 |
Ring network implemented by telephony switches and links |
January 4, 2005 |
| A system for using an under-utilized data channel for carrying additional data, in a network mode. One such channel is the D-channel in the ISDN system. In one implementation, a group of telephone call centers share data, using the D-channel, about the lengths of time incoming callers mu |
| 6820260 |
Customized applet-on-hold arrangement |
November 16, 2004 |
| When a call to a call center is enqueued to await an agent or placed on hold by an agent, an applet customized to satisfy an in-queue experience selected by the caller is downloaded to and executed on the caller's terminal. The applet presents information to the caller, and may also |
| 6766013 |
Timely shut-down of a real-time work center |
July 20, 2004 |
| A call center (100) rejects further calls when the sum of the present time, the anticipated call in-queue wait time (112), and the anticipated call service time (114) for this type (106-108) of call exceeds the closing time of the call center. The call center may redirect the rejected ca |
| 6748073 |
Uninterrupted automatic call distribution during failure and recovery of computer-telephony inte |
June 8, 2004 |
| In a computer integrated telephony call center where an adjunct host (160) normally controls enqueuing of calls (168) in call queues (120) of an ACD system (101) and corresponding call queues (120') of the adjunct host and assigning of the enqueued calls to agents, the ACD system assumes |
| 6741699 |
Arrangement for controlling the volume and type of contacts in an internet call center |
May 25, 2004 |
| The present invention provides a method and system for controlling call volume into a call center. The method and system provides the contacting entity with a file of information for viewing that encourages or discourages continuance of the contact or initiation of another contact wi |
| 6732188 |
Method for providing customer treatment based on specified rules in conjunction with network sou |
May 4, 2004 |
| A call center or other processing system receives an incoming communication over a computer network, determines at least a portion of a network source address of the originator, and utilizes information from the source address to select a particular type of treatment for the communicatio |
| 6694009 |
Estimation of a work item's wait-time from the present stages of processing of preceding work it |
February 17, 2004 |
| To improve the prediction of wait times of calls (23) waiting to be processed, or to improve the prediction of completion times of calls that are presently being processed, in low-volume call centers (10) or splits/skills (21), additional data points are created--either manually or a |
| 6678371 |
Direct customer control of a network router |
January 13, 2004 |
| An entity of a private communications network (24, 26, 28), such as a controller (70) of an ACD system (24), controls the operation of a network router (30) of a public communications network (12, 14, 16), thereby eliminating the need in a network-routing system to send sensitive event |
| 6661889 |
Methods and apparatus for multi-variable work assignment in a call center |
December 9, 2003 |
| A multi-variable work assignment process is used to assign work items, such as voice calls, e-mails and other communications or tasks, to agents in a call center. The multi-variable work assignment process determines whether values of a particular variable characterizing the work items f |
| 6614903 |
Methods and apparatus for service state-based processing of communications in a call center |
September 2, 2003 |
| A call center is configured to determine which of a number of designated service states is associated with a particular skill or type of communication supported by one or more agents of the call center. A particular one of the states represents a branded service level, while other st |
| 6563920 |
Methods and apparatus for processing of communications in a call center based on variable rest p |
May 13, 2003 |
| A call center is configured to determine variable rest periods for one or more agents, based at least in part on factors such as call center service state and agent occupancy. The call center service states may include a number of designated service states associated with a particular sk |
| 6535601 |
Skill-value queuing in a call center |
March 18, 2003 |
| Calls or other communications requiring a particular skill for handling are placed in a corresponding skill queue in a call center. One of a plurality of different values is assigned to each of the communications in the skill queue, with each of the values corresponding to a particular l |
| 6366668 |
Method of routing calls in an automatic call distribution network |
April 2, 2002 |
| The alternate destination redirection (ADR) feature (102) of telephone switching systems (101) or an equivalent is used to implement a "post-route" routing architecture having the benefits of a "pre-route" routing architecture in a network ACD (FIG. 1). The ADR feature is administere |
| 6366666 |
Adjustment of call selection to achieve target values for interval-based performance metrics in |
April 2, 2002 |
| A call selection process in a call center is controlled so as to ensure the achievement of target values for one or more interval-based performance metrics. In an illustrative embodiment, a memory in the call center is used to store information regarding contractual target values of one |
| 6359982 |
Methods and apparatus for determining measures of agent-related occupancy in a call center |
March 19, 2002 |
| A call center is configured to include a capability for generating measures of occupancy for one or more agents. At least one value characterizing an occupancy measure determination for a given agent is stored in a memory associated with the call center, and used in generating an occupan |
| 6356632 |
Call selection and agent selection in a call center based on agent staffing schedule |
March 12, 2002 |
| A call center is configured such that call selection and/or agent selection processes may be based at least in part on stored information regarding agent schedules, such as scheduled break times, training sessions, ends of shifts or other events for the agents. In an illustrative embodim |
| 6353667 |
Minimum interruption cycle time threshold for reserve call center agents |
March 5, 2002 |
| A minimum interruption cycle time is established for a reserve agent in a call center. The reserve agent may be an exclusively reserve agent which processes only calls requiring reserve skills. In an illustrative embodiment, after the reserve agent completes the processing of a call, a |
| 6295353 |
Arrangement for efficiently updating status information of a network call-routing system |
September 25, 2001 |
| Call centers (143-145) use an event-driven scheme (207) with a filter (366) to send status updates to an associated network call-routing system (150). The filter ensures that only minimal status changes are not reported to the network call-routing system. Each call center records (310) t |
| 6192122 |
Call center agent selection that optimizes call wait times |
February 20, 2001 |
| Selection of a suitable call-center agent (106-108) to handle a call is based on which available suitable agent's handling of the call will tend to optimize call wait times. When a call needing a particular skill becomes available (200), all skills of agents in the agent queue (131-139) |
| 6173053 |
Optimizing call-center performance by using predictive data to distribute calls among agents |
January 9, 2001 |
| Selection of a call-center agent (106-108) to handle a call is based on which available agent's handling of the call will tend to optimize call-center performance criteria such as efficiency (e.g., minimize per-call handling time) or derived benefit (e.g., maximize revenue). Each age |
| 6163607 |
Optimizing call-center performance by using predictive data to distribute agents among calls |
December 19, 2000 |
| Selection of a call for handling by a call-center agent (106-108) is based on which call's handling by the available agent will tend to optimize call-center performance criteria such as efficiency (e.g., minimize per-call handling time) or derived benefit (e.g., maximize revenue). Each |
| 6088441 |
Arrangement for equalizing levels of service among skills |
July 11, 2000 |
| In a skills-based ACD, an available agent is reserved and assigned to handle calls needing a "rare" skill of the agent and is prevented from handling calls needing a "common" skill of the agent even if calls needing the common skill are waiting to be handled, if not reserving the agent f |
| 6064731 |
Arrangement for improving retention of call center's customers |
May 16, 2000 |
| In a call center (100) of a business, if it is determined (314-318 or 320) during the handling of a call involving a party who is a customer of the business that the party is at risk of being lost as a customer to the business, an identifier of the party, such as ANI, is captured (300) a |
| 6049547 |
Lookahead interflow of traffic among a plurality of serving sites of one customer |
April 11, 2000 |
| An arrangement for lookahead interflowing traffic among a plurality of serving sites of one customer. Incoming calls received at a site are queued if they cannot be served immediately. Queued calls are then examined periodically and if the call has not yet been served by a local agen |
| 5982873 |
Waiting-call selection based on objectives |
November 9, 1999 |
| Call-center (FIG. 1) performance is improved by assigning different service-time objectives (222) to different types of calls or to call queues (21) for different types of calls, and then selecting (212), for an agent (25) who has just become available (200) to handle a call, a waiting |
| 5905793 |
Waiting-call selection based on anticipated wait times |
May 18, 1999 |
| The maximum wait time for callers in a call center (FIG. 10) is lowered by selecting, for an agent (25) who has just become available to handle a call, a highest-priority waiting call that would most likely wait the longest if it were not selected at this time. Anticipated wait times are |
| 5828747 |
Call distribution based on agent occupancy |
October 27, 1998 |
| A call-distribution function (150) of an ACD system (101) improves the equity of distribution of calls to agents (106-108) by basing the distribution on the agents' individual occupancies. Illustratively, determining an agent's occupancy involves either determining (304) how many cal |
| 5633924 |
Telecommunication network with integrated network-wide automatic call distribution |
May 27, 1997 |
| A plurality of telecommunication switches are coupled to agent communication terminals (ACTs) which are used by agents for handling incoming calls. An integrated control system is coupled to the ACTs and controls the distribution of incoming calls among the ACTs. An intelligent node |
| 5206903 |
Automatic call distribution based on matching required skills with agents skills |
April 27, 1993 |
| Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) equipment is improved by matching the information needs of an incoming caller with the particular expertise of a telemarketing agent who handles such calls. Each incoming call is assigned up to three prioritized skill numbers that estimate skill requirem |
