WO2001040959A1

WO2001040959A1 - System with multi-media real-time queue monitor

Info

Publication number: WO2001040959A1
Application number: PCT/US2000/032601
Authority: WO
Inventors: Bouwe Hamersma; Mark Steven Chodos
Original assignee: Lightning Rod Software, Inc.
Priority date: 1999-12-02
Filing date: 2000-11-30
Publication date: 2001-06-07
Also published as: AU2426501A

Abstract

Methods and apparatus for handling customer interaction requests transmitted to a business by a wide variety of electronic means, including telephone, e-mail, and interactive Web sites. A system (10) that includes one or more customers (20) desiring to communicate with a business (50). These businesses may have one or more business functions (55) and a customer service center (30) for handling requests. Customer interaction request may be queued in one or more queues (180) at a customer service center until a customer service representative is available. The customer interaction request queues may be monitored, controlled and modified in real time. Also provided are a plurality of customer interaction requests features.

Description

TITLE: SYSTEM WITH MULTI-MEDIA REAL-TIME QUEUE MONITOR

L COPYRIGHT PROTECTION

Portions of this application contain material that is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the application, as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright protection to which it is entitled.

IL FIELD

The present invention relates to methods of handling electronic customer contacts, and more particularly, but not by way of limitation, to methods and apparatus for handling customer interactions with customer service centers, wherein the customer interaction

may be initiated via a wide variety of electronic media and formats.

III. BACKGROUND Just a decade ago, most interactions between a business and its customers were via face-to-face meetings between customers and a business representative, over the telephone, or through the mail. As the telephone became a preferred media, automatic call distribution centers (ACDs) were developed to handle large amounts of telephone calls by placing telephone calls in a queue where the calls were held until a customer

service representative was available to handle a particular call. Telephone calls to a business with an ACD system are usually handled on a First-In First-Out (FIFO) basis. Today's current electronic communication technologies have greatly increased the means by which a business and its customers may interact. For example, many businesses allow customers to submit requests via facsimile (fax), over internet-based technologies (e.g., via e-mail), via video, or via enhanced telephone technologies (e.g., interactive voice or touch-tone response systems). Attempts have been made to establish customer call centers where customer interactions via all of these types of media can be processed in a systematic way. For example, borrowing from the ACD concept, customer requests via all of these types of media may be placed in a plurality of queues corresponding to the type of medium, where they can be handled by the next available customer service representative with access to that particular medium. Additionally, instead of utilizing a pure FIFO rule for selecting the next customer request to be handled, each request may be assigned a queue priority based upon a set of business rules, criteria or factors. Calls are then assigned to the next available customer service representative based, at least in part,

upon that queue priority. However, these systems have their limitations. For example, after a customer interaction request has been given a queue priority according to certain, predefined, business rules, information regarding the request may be located or developed that would have led to a different queue priority being assigned. However, no known systems have mechanisms that allow for "repriortization" based upon this information. Moreover, no systems allow for such repriortization of queue priority for a plurality of queues, wherein each queue may have customer interaction requests from a variety of communications media. Accordingly, there exists a need for systems that address these limitations. Such systems will allow businesses to provide greater customer service to existing and new customers, thereby increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty and resulting in greater

profits. IV. SUMMARY

Methods and apparatus are proposed for handling customer interaction requests transmitted to a business by a wide variety of electronic means, including telephone, e- mail, and interactive Web sites. Customer interaction requests may be queued in one or more queues of a customer service system until a customer service representative is available. The customer interaction request queues may be monitored, controlled and modified in real time. Also provided are a plurality of customer interaction request

features.

V. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS Figure 1 is overall functional block diagram of a system embodying the present invention.

Figure 2 is a more detailed functional block diagram of the system of Figure 1. Figure 3 is a flow chart illustrating an operation of one embodiment of the present

invention.

Figure 4 is a GUI that may be displayed by a supervisor. Figures 5A-D are GUIs that may be displayed by a supervisor.

Figures 6A-P are GUIs that may be displayed by a customer, customer service

representative, or supervisor.

Figures 7A-F are GUIs that may be displayed by a customer, customer service

representative, or supervisor. Figures 8A-B are GUIs that may be displayed by a customer, customer service

representative, or supervisor.

Figure 9 is an exemplary skills set table. Figure 10 is a flow chart illustrating workflow with respect to e-mails according to one embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 11 is a functional block diagram illustrating several aspects of the present invention.

VI. DETAILED DESCRIPTION A. System Description

Figure 1 is a functional block diagram of a system 10 embodying the present invention. System 10 comprises one or more customers 20 desiring to communicate with a business 50 (business 50 may also be, e.g., a government organization or any other

entity having customers). Business 50 may have one or more business functions 55 and a customer service center 30 for handling some or all of the communications with customers 20. Customers 20 and the customer service center 30 may be operably connected via an electronic network 40 which may comprise one or more public switched telephone networks, cellular telephone networks, private branch exchange networks, computer networks, satellite networks, internets (including the World Wide Web), intranets, or extranets. Customers 20 and customer service center 30 may communicate through the electronic network 40 by a variety of means or media, including e-mail, telephone, fax, video, web-based communications, or other electronic means. Communications with customer service center 30 may be inbound or outbound.

A customer 20 may be equipped with a variety of electronic communications devices 25, including a telephone, computer with modem, facsimile machine, printer, and/or video equipment. Many interactions by customer 20 with computer service center 30 may be through the customer's computer. The customer's computer may be any conventional processor-based digital computer. The customer's computer may have a graphic user interface (GUI) and may run a variety of applications including an e-mail application (e.g., Microsoft Outlook) and a browser application (e.g., Netscape or Internet Explorer).

In Figure 2, there is shown a more detailed functional block diagram of the customer service center 30 of one embodiment of the present invention. Customer service center 30 may comprise a communications gateway 60, storage 80, one or more customer service representative terminals 90, one or more supervisors terminals 100, and one or more servers 110. These components of system 10 may be operably connected by one or

more information links (collectively numbered as 120). Note that the information links 120 of Figure 2 are illustrative only and do not define the manner in which the various components of customer service center 30 may be operably connected. One skilled in the art will recognize the many different ways in which these elements may be operably connected. The components of customer service center 30 need not be located in the

same geographic area.

The communications gateway 60 may comprise a plurality N of media modules (labeled 70-1 through 70-N) for interfacing to and handling inbound and outbound communications. For example, in Figure 2, there are shown interfaces for web 70-1,

telephone 70-2, video 70-(N-l), and fax 70-N media modules for handling those types of respective inbound and outbound communications. Web media module 70-1 may handle a variety of types of customer interaction requests including, but not limited to, e-mails, Web callback requests, chat, voice over net (VON), Web page collaboration, and interactive Web requests. Telephone media module 70-2 may handle, among other types

of interactions, conventional telephone calls and voice messages (may sometimes be referred to as "voice mails"). Video media module 70-(N-l) may handle video communications, and fax media module 70-N may handle fax-type interactions. One skilled in the art will recognize that system 10 may support a variety of different media modules delivering customer messages and that a particular media module may be configured to handle interaction from more than one medium.

Storage 80 may comprise a plurality of databases 130 for storing, among other things, customer information. Storage 80 may also be used to store some or all of the software and applications included in system 10.

Customer service representative terminals 90 may comprise human operators or customer service representatives 210, screens 220 capable of displaying information in a graphical user interface (GUI) format, interaction devices 230 (such as a telephone, fax machine, video terminal, computer, or other devices capable of communicating

electronically with customer 20 through network 40), and customer service representative software 200. Each customer service representative terminal 90 may have an associated skills set 95 (an example skill set table is shown in Figure 9). The skills set may

determine which customer interaction requests that a particular customer service representative terminal 90 may be provided. For example, the skills set for a particular customer service representative may include information as to the customer service representative's media proficiency of capability (i.e., whether the customer service representative is capable of using one or more mediums), as well as other information used to determine whether the customer service representative will handle the interaction

request.

Supervisor terminals 100 may comprise human operators or supervisors 210, screens 220 capable of displaying information in a GUI format, interaction devices 230 and supervisory software 190. Servers 110 may comprise business application software 140 that corresponds to business function 55, and customer service center software 150 for handling customer 20 interactions with customer service center 30. Customer service center software 150 may comprise an integration toolkit 160 that provides an application programming interface for the business application software 140. Customer service center software 150 may also comprise a logic program engine 170, one or more queues 180, supervisory software 190, and customer service agent software 200. (Some or all of the supervisory software 190 and customer service representative software 200 may also reside at the customer service representative terminals 90 and the supervisor terminals 100, respectively. Supervisory software 190 and customer service representative software 200 may be either client or server applications.)

Queues 180 may queue one or more customer interaction requests until the request

may be handled by a customer service representative operating at his or her customer service representative terminal 90. Queues 180 may be defined by business 50. For example, queues 180 may be defined by the medium by which the customer interaction requests are initiated (e.g., a first queue may have only telephone calls, a second queue may have only e-mails and voice messages, etc.) or by the group of customer service representatives that have access to the queue (e.g., customer service representatives grouped according to similar skills sets 95). A unified queue 180 may contain customer interaction requests from multiple media, preferably every type of media supported by system 10.

Engine 170 may be a rules engine and may determine which queue 180 a particular customer interaction request is to be placed on (e.g., by the type of medium used to submit the interaction request or by the identity of the customer 20) and the queue priority given to a particular customer interaction request. The engine 170 may determine a customer interaction request queue priority by applying one or more rules, criteria, and/or factors defined by business 50 to customer identification or history or other relevant information that may be stored in database 130 or available elsewhere in system 10. The business rules, criteria, and factors may include, for example, the customer's value to business 50, the complexity of the request, the type of medium by which the request is received, the expected customer service representative response, or the type of medium that the customer has requested or prefers. The customer information stored in database 130 may be any type of information associated with the customer that is of relevance to business 50. Supervisory software 190 and customer service representative software 200 may cause one or more GUIs to be displayed at the supervisor terminals 100 and customer service representative terminals 90, respectively. Customer service representative GUIs allow customer service representatives to perform various functions associated with customer interaction requests. Supervisor GUIs allow supervisors to review the status of one or more customer interaction requests and control how and when the requests are responded to by the customer service representatives 90. The supervisor GUIs also allow supervisors to review and control one or more queues 180. For example, as described in more detail below, a supervisor may elect to transfer a customer interaction request from one queue to another because another customer service representative terminal 90 is better

qualified to handle the call. B. Overview of Customer Interaction Requests

Customer interactions with customer service center 30 may be categorized by the type of response provided by the customer service center 30. The interactions may be (1) of the type where the response can be automated (i.e., the customer may be prompted to enter information until an automatic response to the customer's request can be formulated by system 10) or (2) of the type that should be handled by a human operator 210 located at a customer service representative terminal 90. Automated or "self-service" type responses may include interactive voice responses, fax -on-demand, and certain interactive

Web applications (such as automated e-mail responses). Interactions that usually require access to a customer service representative include conventional telephone calls, e-mails, faxes, Web callbacks, chat, voice-over-net, video, voice-messaging, and Web

collaboration. Tables 1 and 2 illustrates some of the types of customer interactions

requests available in system 10.

Tables 1 and 2 are exemplary only and one skilled in the art will recognize that any of the media supported by system 10 may be (1) used by customer 20 to initiate a customer interaction request, (2) used by customer service representative terminal 90 to initiate a response. One skilled in the art will also recognize that any of the media supported by system 10 may be used to provide an automated response to customer 20.

C. Method of Operation

Referring now to Figure 3, customers 20 and customer service center 30 may

interact as follows. (Figure 3 is but one embodiment of the present invention and the actions listed in the blocks need not necessarily be performed in the order shown). At block 300, customer 20 may initiate a customer interaction request by sending the request

via a certain medium (e.g., via e-mail) supported by system 10. The request is transmitted to the customer service center 30 through network 40 and, at block 310, is received by the

appropriate media module 70 of communications gateway 60. At block 320, system 10 may then identify the customer by a variety of means, including conventional caller-ID techniques, by assessing the address from which an e-mail is sent, or by prompting the customer 20 to identify himself. If the customer 20 is identified, at block 330, information related to that customer (e.g., amount of transactions with customer, credit rating, etc., the type of electronic media that the customer is equipped to handle) may be obtained from database 130. At block 340, the customer interaction request may be evaluated by engine 170 according to a predefined set of business rules, criteria, and/or factors. These business rules, criteria, and factors may include certain customer information, the type of media that the interaction request is initiated from, and the type of response expected. For example, the importance or value of the customer 20 to business

50 may be determined and the customer 20 may be given a rating (e.g., preferred customer, etc.). The customer information accessed from database 130 and the customer value generated by engine 170 may be used in various making various decisions in system 10, as described below. At block 350 of Figure 3, system 10 determines whether the customer interaction request is one that allows for an automated response, or whether system 10 has been configured such that a customer service representative should handle the interaction request. If the interaction requests allows for automated response, options (e.g., a menu of options that can be chosen by a touch tone phone) are presented to the customer at block 360. At block 370, an option is also provided to the customer 20 to contact a customer service representative if the other options presented are not sufficient. Additionally and/or alternatively at block 370, customer 20 may chose an option that allows the customer 20 to place a request (e.g., a voice message) in a queue 180 where it can be attended to by a customer service representative terminal 90 at a later time. In this latter case, the customer 20 may then exit the system 10 and await the response from the

customer service representative terminal 90.

Turning now to block 380, system 10 executes the customer's request (by, e.g., booking a flight, providing requested information by e-mail, etc.). If the situation requires, automated responses that are to transmitted to a customer 20 may also queued in an outbound queue until the automated response may be transmitted (e.g., if sufficient resources are not available, the automated response may be queued). At block 390, if the customer's interaction request has been completed, the customer database 130 may be updated and the interaction completed at block 410. At block 390, if the customer has further requests that need to be performed, operation is returned to block 360.

If, on the other hand, at block 350, the customer's interaction request is better handled by a customer service representative then, at block 420, the skills set table 95 may be accessed so that it may be determined whether a customer service representative terminal 90 is available that possesses the skills necessary to handle the customer's interaction request. If so, the interaction request is routed to that customer service representative terminal 90 at block 430 and operation proceeds as in blocks 440, 450, and 460. If, however, a qualified customer service representative terminal 90 is not available

at block 420, the customer interaction request is given a queue priority by engine 170 and placed on one of a plurality of queues 180. As described above, the queue priority may be set according to rules determined by business 50 and the currently available customer information.

While a customer interaction request is pending in a queue 180, system 10 may provide the customer 20 with a variety of services, including music, news, the ability to enter more customer associated information, or silence. These services may be selectable

by the customer 20 in the same manner that a customer 20 interacts with automated response portions of system 10. Several of these aspects of system 10 are illustrated in

Figure 11.

Information relevant to a customer interaction request may be continually updated while the interaction request is pending in a queue. For example, the customer 20 may choose to enter more information associated with the customer 20 while the customer's interaction request is pending in a queue, or system 10 may record information associated with the customer's activities while the customer's interaction request is in a queue (e.g., whether the customer has selected to view another web site page, etc.). Information such as queue position or remaing wait time may also be displayed or announced to the customer.

Thus, at block 480, a supervisor terminal 100 with control access to queue 180 may be used to reprioritize the customer interaction request on the queue 180. The reprioritization may, for example, be based upon an application of the business rules to customer or business information that only becomes available after the customer

interaction request is originally placed on the queue 180. This occurs at block 490 where the supervisor may change the priority of the customer interaction request on a queue or

even place the customer interaction request on a different queue. By allowing a supervisor terminal 100 to change the queue priority of customer interaction requests in real-time, the customer service center may operate more efficiently and provide greater customer service.

D. Supervisor Operations 1. Status and Control Features

System 10 provides supervisor terminals 100 with a variety of status and control features with respect to how and when customer interaction requests are handled by the customer service representatives terminals 90. In Figure 4, there is shown a supervisor queue manager window 2000 that may be displayed at supervisor terminals 100. The queue manager window 2000 may be divided into a plurality of subwindows including an

actions window 2010, a queue window 2020, and a customer interaction request window 2030. The supervisor terminals 100 may use queue window 2020 to select one or more of the queues 180 (including every queue by selecting "All Queues" in the example window shown). This selection will cause the customer interaction requests on the selected queue(s) to be displayed in the customer interaction request window 2030. In an alternative embodiment, the contents of more than one queue may be displayed simultaneously.

The customer interaction requests are available for viewing by supervisor

terminals 100 the moment that they are placed in queue. The interaction requests may be listed in customer interaction request window 2030 in an order or manner selected by the supervisor (e.g., according to their original priority, according to the amount of time in the queue, according to the value of the customer 20 to business 50, etc.). The information displayed with respect to each customer interaction request displayed in window 2030 may include the customer's name, location, or other customer information stored in database 130 or otherwise available in system 10. The information displayed with respect to each customer interaction request in subwindow 2030 may also include information relating to the particular customer interaction request, including the amount of time that the request has been on the queue 180, whether the customer 20 is currently "on-line" and waiting for a customer service representative (e.g., if customer 20 has left a voice message, customer 20 may have exited system 10, but if customer 20 has initiated a conventional telephone call, customer 20 may be waiting on the telephone for a response)

and an indication of the customer's value to business 50.

In another window displayed at supervisor terminals 100 or in a subwindow of window 2000, the following information may also be displayed: ^• The status of each customer service representative terminal 90 (e.g., whether the representative is logged in to the system, responding to a customer interaction request, time spent on various types of activities, etc.).

• The status of all or some of the customer representatives terminals 90 as a group (e.g., how many are logged in, how many are responding to a customer interaction request).

• Average time calculations (e.g., average time a customer interaction response is in a queue, average time spent on a response).

• Whether a customer on a queue has terminated or abandoned the interaction request before interacting with a customer service representative terminal 90. Displaying some or all of the information described above, may allow a supervisor to make informed decisions as to how and when particular customer interaction requests

are handled.

Action window 2010 allows the supervisor to perform one or more actions with respect to a selected queue 180 or a selected customer interaction request within a queue 180. For example, in Figure 4, the supervisor terminal 100 has the option of handling a certain customer interaction requests herself, dropping a customer interaction request from system 10, or issuing a message to the customer 20 (e.g., a request that the customer 20 be patient, etc.). The supervisor terminal 100 may also reprioritize a customer interaction request and/or transfer the request to a different queue or a different customer

service representative terminal 90. The supervisor terminal 100 may also attach instructions to a particular customer interaction request that informs a customer service representative how the particular request should be handled. 2. Customer Interaction Request Reports

Supervisory software 190 may allow supervisor terminals 100 to generate a variety of reports associated with customer interaction requests. For example, in Figures 5A and 5B, supervisor terminals 100 may generate a chart visually displaying in a chosen manner,

the percentage of the types of interaction request received by customer service center 30 over a selected period of time.

C. Features

Some specific features of the present invention are described below. These features are exemplary only and not intended in a limiting sense.

1. Business Web Site

The present invention may be of particular benefit to a business 50 having a web site that allows customers to initiate interactions requests. Referring now to Figures 6A- x, a customer 20 may interact with the customer service center 30 of business 50 via the business' web site 1000 (shown in same Figures 6A-P is the web site 1000 of a fictitious business — "Cyber-Trekking" — offering fictitious products 1001 (e.g., a trip to "Racy Rome in 47 B.C.")). The business' web site 1000 may be displayed on a customer's computer having a GUI display and may be accessed through via a typical browser application (e.g., Microsoft Internet Explorer). In Figure 6B, the customer 20 has selected one of the business' offered products

(the trip to "Racy Rome in 47 B.C."), leading the customer 20 to another page in the customer's web site 1000. Here, the customer 20 may desire to learn more about the offered product or to purchase the offered product and, therefore, may wish to interact with a customer service representative of business 50 to do so. Customer 20 may then select the customer interaction button 1010 (shown here as a "Cybercall" button) in a conventional manner (e.g., using a "mouse" to "click" on the button 1010).

The customer interaction button 1010 may cause another page in the business' web site 1000 to be displayed, as shown in Figure 6C. This page may display selection buttons 1020 corresponding to one or more of the types of media that a customer 20 may

use to interact with customer service center 30. For example, in Figure 6C, the customer 20 may select to interact with customer service center 30 via a telephone callback (also referred to as "Web Page callback"), chat, voice-over net, or e-mail. Each of these media will be discussed in turn below (various other types of media are, of course, contemplated by system 10).

a. Web Page Callback

In Figure 6C, the customer 20 has selected (indicated by circle) to have the customer service center 30 "call" her back (e.g., through a conventional telephone call, e- mail, fax, etc.). At the customer service center 30, such a request will be recognized as one that may be prioritized and placed in a queue 180. (As described above, the priority of this callback request may be changed by a supervisor 100 monitoring queue 180). Accordingly, in Figure 6D, system 10 may display to customer 20 the customer's position in a queue 180 and the estimated time at which the customer will be called back. The customer may also be given the option of requesting an even later time at which to be

called back by selecting button 1030. Figure 6L shows an alternative display that system 10 may provide to a customer 20 with a customer interaction request in a queue 180. The display shown in Figure 6L gives the customer the option of canceling the request or rescheduling the request, as well as providing queue position, time on queue and estimated remaining time on queue information.

Note that through conventional techniques, a customer 20 may be identified when she accesses business' web site 1000. In such a case, the customer need not be prompted to enter a telephone number (or other address, etc. at which to be contacted) at which to receive the callback because a default telephone number may have been set.

Alternatively, the customer 20 may always be given the option of entering a callback number.

Turning now to Figure 6E, there is shown a GUI window 1110 displayed at a customer service representative terminal 90 that is associated with the customer's request for a callback shown in Figures 6A-D. This GUI window 1110, however, is representative

of the GUI displayed at customer service representative terminal 90 for any type of customer interaction request. GUI window 1110 may comprise a plurality of

subwindows, including a customer service representative status subwindow 1050 and a customer interaction subwindow 1040. Each subwindow (as well as any window or subwindow within system 10) may comprise one or more menus, buttons, further

subwindows, text windows, tabs, etc.

Customer service representative status subwindow 1050 may include the following information relevant to the customer service representative terminal 90: (1) the customer service representative or agent number, the representative's profile including a listing of the queues 180 that the representative has access to, the number of customers in a particular queue 180, and information relating to the time worked by the representative (shown collectively as 1090) and (2) a call information subwindow 1100 that may display the current type of customer interaction request, the customer or caller's identification, and other information related to a specific customer including the information stored in

database 130. Such information may be available as a "screen pop" - - it may be instantaneously displayed at the customer service representative terminal 90 when the associated customer interaction request is accessed for processing.

The customer interaction subwindow 1040 may display customer information retrieved from database 130 or information related to the customer interaction request.

Such information is selectable via tab 1060 and it too may be available as a screen pop. For example, in Figure 6E, the customer interaction subwindow 1040 is displaying information related to the offered product that customer 20 has selected. In this manner, the customer service representative may interact intelligently with the customer with respect to the customer's request. In Figure 6F, the customer service representative has

selected the "Web Page" tab 1060 causing one or more of the web pages previously or currently viewed by customer 20 to be displayed. (Further description of this web page collaboration feature of system 10 is discussed below). This too makes interaction with customer 20 easier (e.g., customer service representative may relate to the customer 20 the particular location on the web page 1000 to find a particular options, etc.).

b. E-mail

Turning now to Figure 6G, the customer 20 has chosen to interact with business 50 via e-mail. In Fig. 6H, web site 1000 has provided customer with an e-mail window 1120 addressed to business 50. The customer 20 may enter text in subwindow 1130, including any questions that the customer 20 may have for the customer service

representative 90. In Figures 6I-J, the customer representative GUI window 1110 associated with the customer's e-mail request is shown. (At this point, the customer's e-mail has been received by customer service center 30, the customer 20 may have been identified, relevant customer information may have been accessed, the e-mail may have been prioritized in a queue 180, and "re-prioritized" by supervisor 100, before being accessed by customer service representative terminal 90). In the customer interaction subwindow 1040, the customer's e-mail is displayed. The customer service representative may chose to reply to the e-mail or print it with button 1140. As shown in Figure 6J, the reply may be one of a plurality of predefined responses selectable by button 1150 or one custom tailored to the customer's request. Attachments may also be sent to the customer through reply e-mail. Note that, as with many customer interaction requests, the reply or response need not be via e-mail — the customer 20 may request that the response be in some other media (e.g., fax, telephone call, etc.) or customer service representative may desire to use some other

media.

In Figure 6K, the customer supervisor representative terminal 90 is able to classify or enter information related to the call in the customer interaction subwindow 1040. The information entered may be used to update database 130. This option may, of course, be available to the customer service representative when responding to any type of customer

interaction request.

In an alternative embodiment of system 10, when the customer service representative terminal 90 has formulated a response (custom or predefined) to the

customer's e-mail, the response be routed to a supervisor terminal 100 for review. A queue may be used to store one or more of e-mails routed to supervisor 100. Supervisor terminals 100 may edit the response e-mail in a particular manner before sending it to the customer 20. The e-mail may also be "cc'ed" or distributed to the customer service representative, so that the customer service representative may review any changes made by the supervisor. This embodiment of system 10 is illustrated in Figure 10.

Customer interaction request via e-mail need not, of course, originate from the business' web site 1000. Business 50 may receive e-mails from customers 20 via conventional e-mail application (e.g., Microsoft Outlook) that are not associated with the web site 1000.

c. Chat

Figures 6M-R illustrate various displays associated with customer interactions request for a chat session with a customer service representative terminal 90. In Figure

6M, the customer 20 has chosen the chat customer interaction request on web site 1000. In Figure 6N, the customer service representative may respond with a chat message as shown in subwindow 1 160. (Alternatively, the customer 20 may chose or be prompted to issue the first message). As with e-mail responses, the message transmitted by customer

service representative terminal 90 may be selected from a list of predefined responses or may be a custom tailored one. Note that in Figure 6N, customer information may be provided to the customer service representative terminal 90. In Figure 6N, for example,

the customer 20 may have previously selected the "Rome" offering and now wishes to ask questions of a customer service representative terminal 90 via a chat session. In Figure 6O, there is shown the customer 20 display for the requested chat session. In Figure 6O, a chat window 1170 has been opened that displays the customer's chat input as well as the customer service representative's response. Chat dialogue may l continue in this manner. Figure 6P illustrates an alternative window displayed at the customer service representative terminal 90.

d. Voice-over-net

Customer 20 may also select to interact with a customer service representative via 6 a voice-over-net application. This type of customer interaction request will be handled in a similar manner to conventional telephone calls, discussed below.

4. Web Page Collaboration

For a customer 20 and customer service representative 90 to interact more

1 effectively, system 10 provides for a plurality of web collaboration features. For example, assume that customer 20 has initiated a customer interaction request via a chat session because the customer 20 has question regarding the company's web site. The customer

20 may display a chat session window and the web page in question. System 10 allows the customer service representative terminal 90 to display the same web page that the customer 20 is viewing. If customer 20 subsequently changes web pages (e.g., by clicking on a link), system 10 may be configured such that the web page displayed to the customer service representative terminal 90 is similarly changed. The same may also be true at the customer's computer for web pages viewed by the customer service representative

terminal 90. 1 Additionally, the customer service representative may desire to redirect the customer 20 to a different web page. System 10 may be enabled such that if the customer service representative terminal 90 switches to another web page, the customer's display will also switch to that web page (this may be referred to as a "page push"). The customer service representative may then comment via the chat session on the web page to which the customer 20 has been redirected.

The ideas embodied in the web page collaboration feature may be applied to filling out or completing web based forms. For example, a web page may display a form that prompts the customer 20 to fill in certain information. The customer 20, however, may not understand what type of information is requested or may not have the information. In this case, a customer service representative terminal 90 may collaborate with customer 20 in filling out the form ~ both parties may have the ability to input certain information.

Figures 7A-F are illustrative of these aspects of system 10.

5. Fax

Customer 20 may select to interact with a customer service representative via fax. Customer 20 may fax a document to customer service center 30 where it may be input into system 10 such that it may be displayed by customer service representative terminal 90 (e.g., the fax may be digitally scanned or the fax image file captured and placed in storage 80). The fax received from the customer 20 may be displayed in the customer interaction subwindow 1040 for viewing by the customer service representative 90. Responses may then be formulated in manners similar to those described above. Figures 8 A-B illustrate some of these principles of system 10. In particular, Figure 8 A illustrates

an example customer fax being displayed in a customer service representative's GUI and

Figure 8B illustrates that, should the customer service representative's response be in fax

form, a plurality of predefined responses may be available. Customer service representative terminal 90, of course, need not necessarily respond by fax. 6. Telephone

Telephone calls initiated by customer 20 to customer service center 30 may be handled according to the principles of system 10, as described above. A telephone call may be received at customer service center 30 and placed in a queue 180. While the customer 20 is "on hold," system 10 may allow business 50 to play messages to customer 20. During the hold time, system 10 may also be identifying the customer 20 and accessing information associated with that customer 20. The customer's call may be prioritized on a queue 180 according to business rules and this priority may be modified by supervisor 100.

D. Remarks

1. Summary

In summary, some of the novel features of system 10 include: 1. A customer 20 may interact with a business 50 through a customer service

representative terminal 90 associated with a customer service center 30. The customer 20 may interact with the customer service representative 90 via a variety of media, including telephone, e-mail, chat, fax, etc. The customer service representative terminal 90 need

not necessarily respond to the customer 20 via the same medium through which the interaction requested was initiated. At the customer's request, or for other reasons, the customer service representative's response may be via a different medium. 2. If a customer's request is better handled by a customer service representative (than by an automated ςesponse system), the request is routed based upon the type of request, the skills of the available customer service representative(s) terminals 90, and /or other associated information, to a specific customer service representative terminal 90. If no suitable customer service representative terminal 90 is available, the customer interaction request is assigned a priority according to a predefined set of business rules, criteria, and factors and placed on a queue. The supervisor may monitor and control a unified queue. In other words, system 10 automatically routes, queues, prioritizes, and distributes customer request interactions to a capable customer service representative.

3. Each queue that a customer interaction request is placed upon may be monitored and controlled in real-time by a supervisor with access to and control over information transmitted and received by the customer service representatives. The supervisor may monitor and control a unified queue. The supervisor may reprioritize a particular customer interaction request (perhaps based upon information that becomes known to the supervisor after the request is originally prioritized) or move the customer interaction request to a different queue or to a different customer service representative.

4. At a customer service representative terminal 90, a unified queue is available in which the customer service representative may receive an inbound customer interaction request from any of the electronic media disclosed and transmit an outbound interaction via any of the electronic media disclosed. The inbound and outbound mediums need not be the same.

2. Miscellaneous It will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art that innumerable variations, modifications, applications, and extensions of these embodiments and principles can be made without departing from the principles and spirit of the invention. For example: • The actions illustrated in the Figures need not be performed in the order shown (e.g., a customer may be identified and associated customer information accessed from database 130 before the customer selects to opt for an automated response).

• Some or all of the supervisor's monitoring and control capabilities may be provided to one or more customer service representatives 90.

• Custom messages may be provided to customers 20 while their interaction requests are pending in a queue.

• Customer interaction requests that may be responded to by automated responses may also be queued in situations where sufficient resources are not available to handle all such customer interaction requests immediately. • A customer interaction request may be kept on a queue 180 after the customer 20 has terminated the interaction, even if the customer 20 never interacted with a customer service representative terminal 90. Similarly, information associated with the

customer interaction request may remain in storage. In this manner, such "lost calls" and their associated information may be tracked and follow up responses may be provided as needed. This aspect of system 10 is illustrated in Figure 1 1.

• In Figure 6D, advertisements may be displayed or presented while the customer's interaction request is pending in a queue. By accessing customer information

from database 130, the advertisement may be tailored for a particular customer. Alternatively, the customer can be offered a menu of wait activities or content such as

music, joke of the day, news or other entertainments.

Accordingly, it is intended that the scope of the invention be only limited as

necessitated by the accompanying claims.

Claims

l VII.CLAIMSWhat is claimed is:

1. A method of doing business, comprising:

receiving a customer interaction request initiated via an electronic medium; determining whether the customer interaction request involves interaction with a customer service representative and, if so: determining whether a customer service representative is available and, if not: queuing the customer interaction request according to an assigned initial priority; 1 re-evaluating the assigned initial priority after the customer interaction request has been queued; and presenting the customer interaction request to a customer service representative according to the customer interaction request's priority after re-evaluating.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the act of re-evaluating the assigned initial

priority comprises changing the assigned priority.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the act of re-evaluating the assigned initial priority comprises re-evaluating the assigned priority according to business rules.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the act of re-evaluating the assigned initial priority comprises re-evaluating the assigned priority based upon information obtained

1 after the priority was assigned.

5. A method for handling customer interaction requests that are initiated by customers using a plurality of electronic media operably linked to a customer service center of a business, comprising: establishing a customer interaction request queue in computer storage;

providing a plurality of customer service representative terminals, each with an associated set of service skills;

receiving a customer interaction request at the customer service center;

identifying the customer that initiated the customer interaction request; accessing information associated with the customer that initiated the customer interaction request;

placing the received customer interaction request in the customer interaction request queue, by assigning a priority to each queued customer interaction request that is determined in part by analyzing the accessed information associated with the customer; re-evaluating the assigned priority after the customer interaction request has been queued; determining whether there is available a customer service representative terminal with a service skill that responsive to the customer interaction request and if so, presenting the customer interaction request to that customer service representative terminal.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the act of accessing information associated with the customer comprises accessing information indicative of the value of the customer to

the business.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein the act of assigning a priority is determined in part by a set of businesses rules.

8. The method of claim 5, wherein the act of re-evaluating the assigned initial priority comprises changing the assigned initial priority before the customer interaction request is provided to a customer service representative terminal.

9. The method of claim 5, further comprising monitoring in real-time the customer

interaction request queue after a customer interaction request has been assigned a priority.

10. The method of claim 5, further comprising displaying some of the accessed information associated with the customer that initiated the customer interaction request at the customer service representative terminal where the customer interaction request is presented.

11. The method of claim 5, further comprising determining whether a customer interaction request received at the customer service center requires a customer service representative and, if not: providing an automated resource to respond to the customer interaction request.

12. A system for handling customer interaction requests received by a business, wherein the customer interaction requests may be initiated via a plurality of electronic media, comprising: a plurality of customer service representative terminals for receiving information associated with customer interaction requests and for responding to the customer interaction requests; at least one queue on which customer interaction requests may be assigned a priority and placed before being routed to one of the customer service representative

terminals; and a queue controller for selecting which customer service representative terminal a customer interaction request is routed to; wherein the queue controller may route customer interaction requests to customer service representative terminals according to information other than the assigned priority.

13. The system of claim 12, further comprising logic for assigning a priority to a customer interaction request according to rules defined by the business.

14. The system of claim 12, further comprising:

a skills set associated with one or more of the customer service representative terminals; and logic for determining whether a customer service representative terminal may receive a customer interaction request based upon an associated skills set.

15. The system of claim of claim 12, further comprising a storage for storing information associated with customers that initiate customer interaction requests.

16. The system of claim 12, further comprising: logic for determining whether a customer interaction request requires human

interaction and, if so: determining whether a customer service representative terminal is

available; and if not: providing an automated resource to respond to the customer interaction

request.

17. The system of claim 12, further comprising: at least one communications device associated with the customer service

representative terminal.

18. The system of claim 12, wherein at least one customer service representative

terminal comprises: a GUI having a window capable of displaying information associated with a customer interaction request.

19. A method for interacting with a customer via a network capable of providing an

interactive, displayable site accessible by customers of a business operating the site, wherein the site may have a plurality of displayable pages, comprising: providing the site, such that at least one page is presentable to a customer; receiving a customer interaction request; routing the customer interaction request to a terminal associated with the business

that is capable of displaying at least one page of the site; interacting with the customer via the terminal, including: displaying the same page at the terminal as is displayed to the customer; causing a selected change in the page displayed at the customer automatically to change the page displayed at the terminal; and vice versa.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction request comprises receiving a customer interaction request via a page of the interactive

site.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of interacting with the customer via the

terminal, further comprises: interacting with the customer via a chat session.

22. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of interacting with the customer via the terminal, further comprises: displaying at the terminal information associated with the customer.

23. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of interacting with the customer via the terminal, further comprises: allowing the customer to enter information into a form displayed on a page; and allowing an operator of the terminal to enter information into the form displayed on the page.

24. A method for handling customer interaction requests that are initiated by customers using a plurality of electronic media operably linked to a business, comprising: assigning a priority to customer interaction requests according to information associated with the customer that initiated the customer interaction request and predefined

rules; queuing customer interaction requests on a queue; updating information associated with at least one customer interaction request while the at least one customer interaction request is in the queue; monitoring a portion of the updated information; re-evaluating the priority assigned to at least one of the customer interaction

requests; and routing at least one customer interaction request to a customer service representative terminal capable of handling the customer interaction requests.

25. The method of claim 24, further comprising: identifying the customer by analyzing information associated with the customer interaction request; and accessing previously compiled information associated with the customer.

26. The method of claim 24, wherein the act of re-evaluating the priority assigned to some of the customer interaction requests comprises changing the assigned priority based

upon some of the updated information.

27. A method for handling customer interaction requests that are initiated by customers using a plurality of electronic media operably linked to a business, comprising: receiving a customer interaction request;

determining whether the customer interaction request requires interaction with a customer service representative and, if so: determining whether a customer service representative is available and, if not:

assigning a priority to the customer interaction request; queuing the customer interaction request according to its assigned priority; monitoring information associated with the queued customer interaction

request; and allowing the customer interaction request's priority to be changed based upon the information associated with the queued customer interaction request.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction request further comprises receiving a customer interaction request via an e-mail.

29. The method of claim 27, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction request further comprises receiving a customer interaction request via a telephone.

30. The method of claim 27, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction request further comprises receiving a customer interaction request via a chat session.

31. The method of claim 27, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction request further comprises receiving a customer interaction request via a facsimile.

32. The method of claim 27, wherein the act of receiving a customer interaction

request further comprises receiving a customer interaction request via a network site.

33. The method of claim 32, wherein the network site comprises a plurality of pages and wherein a customer at a remote terminal initiated the customer interaction request via the network site, further comprising displaying the same network site page as the customer that initiated the customer interaction request.

34. The method of claim 33, further comprising changing the page displayed when the customer changes the page displayed at the customer's terminal.

35. The method of claim 33, further comprising changing the page that the customer is displaying at the customer terminal.

36. The method of claim 33, further comprising interacting with the customer via another electronic format when the customer is displaying an network site page.

37. The method of claim 36, further comprising displaying a form on the page and allowing information on the form to be entered by the customer and a customer service

representative.

38. The method of claim 27 further comprising: identifying the customer that initiated the customer interaction request; and accessing information associated with the customer.

39. The method of claim 38 wherein the act of identifying the customer comprises identifying the customer by analyzing information associated with the customer interaction request.

40. The method of claim 38 wherein the act of identifying the customer comprises identifying the customer by prompting the customer to identify himself.

41. The method of claim 27, further comprising: while the customer interaction request is in the queue, updating information associated with the queued customer interaction request and

updating information associated with the customer that initiated the customer interaction request.

42. The method of claim 27, wherein if the customer interaction request does not requires interaction with a customer service representative, then: providing a queue for customer interaction requests that do not require a customer service representative;

providing customer selectable automated responses; providing a queue for the customer selectable automated responses.

43. A method for handling customer interaction requests that are initiated by customers using a plurality of electronic media operably linked to a business, comprising: receiving a customer interaction request;

identifying information associated with the customer that initiated the customer interaction requests; queuing the customer interaction request; determining whether the customer has terminated the customer interaction request and, if so; accessing information associated with the customer and associated with the customer interaction request; and initiating an interaction request to the customer.

44. A method for handling customer interaction requests that are initiated by customers using a plurality of electronic media operably linked to a business, comprising:

receiving a customer interaction request; determining whether the customer interaction request requires interaction with a customer service representative and, if so: determining whether a customer service representative is available and, if

not: assigning a priority to the customer interaction request; queuing the customer interaction request according to its assigned priority; and

providing the customer with options during the time the customer's interaction request is queued.

45. The method of claim 44, wherein the act of providing the customer with option includes providing the customer with the option of providing information associated with

the customer.