Nailing Satisfaction and Cost

When European appliances and electronics retailer Darty decided to implement a KM system from Kaidara Software, its objectives were clear: increase customer satisfaction and trim costs. As a result of the project, however, Darty, which handles more than 4 million calls per year and about 1.3 million home repairs, not only met its expectations, but transformed its call centers in the process. Darty CIO Philippe Giry says that the centers were not in a position to try to repair customer problems, but were used for order taking and managing after-sales calls. "It was just handling the call, taking the appointment, and giving the information to the technician to manage his intervention at the customer home." Darty evaluated the KM module from a CRM suite provider, but that solution failed to meet expectations. Darty also looked at Kaidara, and decided to deploy Kaidara Advisor, which features case-based reasoning functionality that enables comparison of new cases with cases already in the knowledge base. Cases are then matched with the best solution. The system also has search modes and functionality for beginners and experts of the solution, data analysis and reporting, multilanguage support, and it allows natural language queries. Ninety-five percent of Darty customers now indicate satisfaction with its call center operations. Problems solved over the phone without the assistance of expert technicians also experienced an uptick: more than 20 percent for white goods--appliances like refrigerators--and more than 30 percent for brown goods--electronics like camcorders. Darty hopes to achieve an FCR rate of 70 percent by the end of this year. Giry notes: "Through the call center we are able to be more precise [and] more accurate in the evaluation of the nature of a problem. We pass the information to the technician, and that helps the technician to prepare. As you can imagine, it's a significant saving for us."