Call Centre or Contact Centre, does it matter?

Subscribe To RSSRSS

This is an old debate that is always hanging around in the back ground and it caught my attention again as I was researching on the web last week.  Do we work in Contact Centre's or a Call Centre's?

I have always said that I work in Contact Centre, to me it describes the environment, people contact us and we solve their issues, or we contact people to solve their issues. There are different ways the customer can contact us, text, email, and fax to name a couple, so Contact Centre not Call Centre fits best with me.

I have had examples recently when speaking to non contact centre workers in my day to day chats to people and they have asked what I do.  I say I work in the Contact Centre profession and half the people would go, Ok.  The other half would look blank so I go on to say, call centres and then they click on.

I find that frustrating, maybe I’m been far too precious about this?  I just think Call Centre doesn’t sound interesting or sexy to me; Contact Centre has got a better kick to it with some get up and go.

And we have the TUANZ Contact Centre Awards, so I think NZ companies use the Contact Centre title more.  Strangely, I notice that many overseas companies’s or groups link themselves to ‘Call Centre’s’.

I’m a Contact Centre professional, loud and proud! Not a Call Centre worker. Email me your thoughts megan@tuanz.org.nz

Categories: Events | Lifestyle

ADD YOUR COMMENTS

     

2 comments

  • Grant Casci - TeleConsultants says:

    I must admit, I refer to the business function (Customer Service Centre and Customer Service Professional) rather than the channel environment. To me a CALL centre is just that, focussing on the telephony channel, whereas a CONTACT centre addresses multiple channels, including walk-ins (eg Front Counter).

    In the same way, I often recommend managers recruit on Customer Service experience rather than call/contact centre experience. It's a lot easier to teach phone skills than it is to teach a customer service mindset.

    Added: 10 September 2008, 12:00 p.m. Flag as Spam  |  Flag as Offensive
  • Anne W says:

    I agree about the Customer Service approach. I've gone through the Call Centre, change to Contact Centre, now thinking Service Centre might be the next move. These days with home based agents, shops, centralised processing, sales teams & service teams, phone, web, sms, chat....the mix is huge. We have Sales & service consultants, not Contact Centre consultants. Does it really matter in the scheme of things? I guess it's all about branding. How you want to pitch yourself to your audience. I wonder what the marketers view is? How would an advertising agency describe our industry?

    Added: 19 September 2008, 11:14 a.m. Flag as Spam  |  Flag as Offensive
  • Comments are now closed