For most of us, Labor Day signals the end of the summer season. Families squeeze the last drops of vacation before school restarts and life resettles into ordinary time. For hospitality leaders like Carlson Rezidor, this last push of the season brings high volumes of reservations across its properties along with high expectations for exceptional customer experiences.
Trends continue to show highest U.S. hotel occupancy during summer months, especially since 25% of Americans planned Labor Day travel in 2017. Post-Labor Day shows downward trends one might expect during winter months before starting Spring Break’s upward climb again in February.
During this “low season,” many hospitality contact centers evaluate previous high season performance and customer satisfaction levels in order to address and improve key performance indicators (KPIs) like call abandonment.
With the changing, omnichannel nature of today’s reservation process and ever increasing competition, Carlson Rezidor, one of the globe’s largest hotel groups with 1,400 properties, including the widely known Radisson brand, knew they needed to make a switch that offered greater flexibility and agility in serving guests. Carlson struggled with an outdated Avaya system of premises-based phone switches, which lacked flexibility and was difficult to customize for personalized service.
Consistent experience at every touch point
Carlson chose to move to omnichannel functionality – with its ease-of-use, and ability to quickly switch callers to the next available agent – regardless of where the agent is based. So guests receive swift attention and a more complete experience via any contact channel, at any time of day.
In high volume times, such as summer vacation season, this ability to adjust customer service on the fly makes all the difference in agent effectiveness and guest satisfaction. John Zern, senior director of reservations and customer care for Carlson Rezidor, tells us: “Since we implemented NICE, abandonment has dropped by more than 30%. Why? Because our customers are no longer waiting on hold. NICE moves the guest to the next available agent, or if they prefer, guests can choose to have us call them back when the next agent is free. Just offering that choice reduces frustration, because the worst thing in the world is for a guest is to feel like they don’t have a choice.”
With NICE driving their contact center operations, Carlson remains a top choice for guests in search of exceptional service at every touch point by delivering daily on high expectations, even when the heat is on during high volume seasons.
Read more about Carlson Rezidor’s contact center transformation.
