How IVR Payment Solutions Can Help Relieve The Stress on Staffing and Business Operations
It became evident to businesses and organization during the COVID-19 Pandemic how important it was to have a resilient payment acceptance strategy. At the onset of the pandemic, business leaders were forced to reassess their entire operation processes rapidly, activate business continuity plans (those who had them), make staff reductions, reallocate resources and implement work-at-home models where operationally viable. The ability for businesses to continue to respond promptly to their customers’ phone inquiries, prioritize payment calls, maintain PCI compliance, and secure customer data even as staff are re-deployed to a work-from-home environment became an increasingly critical issue. To address this many businesses turned to remote payment technology and payment automation to not only continue processing customers’ payments without compromising customer service and PCI compliance but also address the stress caused by a significant reduction in staff and capacity. One such technology adoption is IVR Payments which removes live agents/staff from handling credit card information while providing customers with the ability to make payments 24/7 by phone.
IVR Payments (Interactive Voice Response) is a technology that allows customers to make a variety of different credit card and eCheck transactions over the telephone by interacting with an automated system, as opposed to having to provide their credit card/banking information to a live agent. Since it is fully automated, IVR Payments can operate 24/7 as opposed to being limited to a business’s standard hours of operation (standard being an ever-evolving concept). For businesses that still require the involvement of an agent/staff member in the process, IVR Payment solutions can be deployed in such a way as to allow agents/staff to speak to customers and then connect the customer seamlessly when it’s time to collect and process the callers’ credit card.
How to quickly implement an IVR Payment Solution and the Different Types of IVR Payment Solutions
1. Customer Self-Service – IVR Payment Solutions:
With Customer Self-Service IVR Payments your customers call your Company’s existing phone number and select Payments from your front end phone menu (e.g. To Make A Payment Now, Press 1.. You can set it as 1, 2 or 3 whichever works best for your organization). Your phone system will transfer the call to your IVR Payment line, which is branded and configured to your specifications. Your customers can make a payment using their Credit Card, in a PCI Compliant environment with transactions being processed in real-time to your credit card processor/gateway.
2. Agent Assisted - IVR Payment Solutions
While your staff member/customer service agent is speaking with a customer, s/he can transfer your customers to the IVR Payment line when it comes time to collect the customer’s payment information. Your agent can then exit/muted from the call, thereby ensuring that s/he is not privy to your client’s Credit Card Information, leaving your customers confident that their information is safe and secure and you can rest easy, safe in the knowledge that your payment processes are PCI Compliant.
IVR Payment Solutions can help you manage call payment activity efficiently and securely. Among its many advantages are:
- Your customers can securely make phone payments 24/7 outside your regular business hours.
- Reduces stress on your staff and makes operations more efficient and responsive by not having to devote time to handling payment-related calls. This can also work with customer service agents who can be re-deployed to work from home.
- Comply with industry security requirements (PCI and HIPAA) and keep you in scope while you re-deploy your workforce.
- You can handle many concurrent calls without ever missing a payment.
- Transactions flow directly into your existing merchant account without having to make any changes.
- Can connect to your business systems for
look-up
and payment posting.
- Can be deployed in a matter of days. Depending on the complexity of the deployments, implementation times can take as little as 5 to 12 business days.
Our experienced and dedicated team of IVR Payment Solutions specialists can have your IVR Payments Solution up and running in a matter of days (as opposed to weeks or months) with no need for any hardware or software for you to buy or install. Contact us, we are here to help.