Vacay Vendor Resorts to NewVoiceMedia for Better Service

By offering what it refers to as a “heartfelt service culture,” ResorTime (formerly Grand Pacific Resorts) has built a family of more than 20 high-end resorts throughout California and Hawaii. For more than 70,000 families, whom it calls “owners,” a vacation at one of its resorts, which could be nestled among a grove of swaying palms in Kauai or on the shores of Lake Tahoe, is the highlight of their year.

For a company that claims, as ResorTime does, that it lets people “own a piece of paradise,” customer expectations are high. These owners expect the water in their pools to sparkle, their accommodations to be immaculate, and their calls to customer service to be pleasant, quick, and helpful. That last part hadn’t always been possible for the Carlsbad, Calif.–based company.

When he joined ResorTime as vice president of revenue and technology in 2013, Jeff Farr had concerns about the company’s ability to handle customer issues in the manner he knew was possible. The issue wasn’t one of personnel but rather of platform. Its contact center used four different call handling operations. Dropped calls, long wait times, and call misrouting happened far too frequently. The technology offered limited visibility; supervisors couldn’t properly monitor calls or provide feedback to upper management. “It was clearly time to take our contact center to the next level in order to provide consistent and high-quality service,” Farr says.

To retool the outdated system, ResorTime turned to NewVoiceMedia’s ContactWorld for Service, a cloud-based customer service platform. “I liked the fact that Salesforce.com had heavily invested in NewVoiceMedia, and my independent research through the [Salesforce] AppExchange showed they had really strong references,” Farr says.

The contact center began delivering a better service experience almost immediately. ContactWorld’s end-of-call feedback system provided more thorough analytics about the call by creating detailed reports through Salesforce. Managers were finally able to see how the contact center was performing in real time. When minor adjustments needed to be made, the data and insights were there to point decision makers in the right direction.

Under the new system, all calls are logged in to Salesforce’s Service Cloud. Performance and resolution rates have improved significantly. Customers are now getting responses in three or four minutes, compared to the day or two it took with the old system. Agents can handle higher call volumes.

As ResorTime became more comfortable with the advanced system, Farr was thrilled with the results. Efficiency spiked, with a 36 percent improvement in call handling, and agent idle time dropped from 47 percent to just 11 percent. And ResorTime’s Net Promoter Score improved notably, reaching 83.9.

One of the most unique aspects of ContactWorld, and one that ResorTime has turned into a revenue stream, is its skill-based routing. When a call comes in, it is funneled to the agent best trained to handle the situation. This allows the most seasoned agents to be immediately placed on potential sales calls, a strategy that has caused the number of conversions per call to rise. Additionally, less experienced agents are no longer pressured to take calls they can’t handle. Morale has increased among the 28-member call team, and employees see the additional oversight as a chance to showcase their skills.

“We’re starting to see some of the true performers who get real pride in their work. They now know how they are performing in relation to [service-level agreements] so they can manage their day to take tangible steps to improve or share best practices. They have full visibility into how they are doing as a team, and it has fostered a family environment,” said Darren Polino, director of contact center operations, in a statement.

As recent years show, ResorTime has no plans to stop growing. Since ContactWorld is cloud-based, the solution can grow with the company.

The Payoff

Using NewVoiceMedia's ContactWorld for Service, ResorTime saw the following results:

• call handling improved by 36 percent;
• response times dropped from one or two days to three or four minutes;
• agent idle time decreased from 47 percent to 11 percent; and
• its Net Promoter Score reached 83.9.