Siemens Business Services Announces VoIP for Travel With CRM Link

Siemens (News - Alert) Business Services officials have announced that "in the future," the services "will operate and install ready-to-use VoIP systems for travel companies." It's being presented with an optional CRM-linked application.

Officials estimate this will allow "up to 20 percent of the operating costs" to be saved.

In the future, they contend, "travel operators will be able to handle everything via one telephone system as basis for the VoIP" system, whether it's "flight reservations on the internet, hotel inquiries by phone, car rental by fax or special offers for holiday makers."

If the dialed number at a travel agent’s is busy, the VoIP application forwards the call automatically through the intranet to the next free number. If all the agents’ call lines are busy, the caller is forwarded to the next branch of the travel agency.

An optional CRM application can be linked to the VoIP system, so "if a travel agent salesperson wants to address a particular customer group with a holiday offering, he can retrieve the necessary information from the database," officials explain.

The use of computer-telephony integration speeds up the dialing process, as the agent no longer has to key in the number. As soon as a call has been made, the system jumps to the next phone number in the CRM system and dials it automatically. This, officials explain, is what will save up to 20 percent of operating costs.

In March Siemens announced that "its major contact-center systems will be integrated completely with Microsoft's (News - Alert) Dynamics CRM software," according to industry observer Elizabeth Millard.

The company's HiPath ProCenter Agile and HiPath ProCenter Standard, Millard said, "will have out-of-the-box integration with the Microsoft application, with the goal of giving customers faster first-contact call resolution," citing Siemens officials.

As Millard explains, the streamlined integration also is designed to remove the need for manual configuration between the two systems, which reduces deployment time and makes management more streamlined.

Siemens Business Services claims to be, "with regard to outsourcing and IT maintenance," officials say, "among the top ten providers worldwide. Sales in fiscal year 2005 (ending 30 September 2005) came to around EUR 5.4 billion, 75 percent of which was achieved outside the Siemens organization."

David Sims is a contributing editor for TMCnet. For more articles please visit David Sims’ columnist page.

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