MERLONI Elettrodomestici UK has just completed the integration of a massive project to centralise its European call centre operations here in Peterborough. This week, business editor SARAH GUNTHARDT looks at the major investments that have been made at the city employer, which now has a workforce in excess of 1,400 people.
PETERBOROUGH is now home to the call centre for one of the largest white goods after-sales service operations in Europe, supporting the Hotpoint, Indesit, Cannon and Creda brands.
More than £7 million has been invested in the call centre ““ the largest in Greater Peterborough, which has replaced 13 registered service offices which were throughout the UK.
The first phase of the call centre opened in April 2003 with 15 people transferred from existing operations in London, Manchester and Peterborough, and 36 new recruits.
Today, the call centre is at full strength with 377 employees, both full and part-time, headed up by call centre manager Gordon Wedgwood, who was himself relocated from Manchester.
The call centre advisors handle around 65,000 calls a week with Monday still being the busiest day despite the changing culture which means the call centre is open seven days a week to cover retailers’ trading hours.
Mr Wedgwood said: “We chose Peterborough because we wanted to keep it on the manufacturing site. A lot of call centres have gone over to India, but we need the level of knowledge and skill set that we have been able to find here in Peterborough area.
“It’s not just call-processing, it’s slightly more complex than that. When we opened the call centre we looked at the hours of opening and created a flexible butterfly shift which offers a sizeable bonus. There is a bank of around 30 people willing to cover this shift which may mean their hours change at a week’s notice to cope with an increase in workload through holidays or sickness.
“We can work out the extra cover needed through our Blue Pumpkin Software ““ which is linked to the telephone system and allows you to predict the workload demand based on previous call volumes in previous weeks.”
Peterborough also houses the UK headquarters of Merloni UK which opened last year.
A new training centre has also been created on site to enable them to conduct their training in-house. It features two classrooms, which means trainees can become a virtual part of the call centre.
All new employees undergo a two-week induction course which is a combination of soft skills such as communication and IT skills. This is followed up by a week buddying up with an experienced colleague in the contact centre and working with external companies to develop the various areas of service even further.
Mr Wedgwood is also in charge of customer complaints, which the company is keen to keep to a minimum.
He said: “We have simplified our automated telephone system to use interactive voice recognition to try and route people to the right department to speak to someone who can help immediately.
“The very nature of our work means because we are a service industry we are dealing with a percentage of appliances that have broken down which can prompt complaints but we have a very low figure of breakdowns considering the size of our market share.
“It’s important to listen to what the staff and customers are telling us about our business.”
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