Kaman phone system aids in disaster preparedness
by Rich Vurva
With winter fast approaching, many distributors are scrambling to put together contingency plans to take care of customers when winter storms knock out power at branches and distribution centers. At Kaman Industrial Technologies, a new phone system has already proved to be effective in minimizing customer service outages caused by weather emergencies.
The new Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) system was originally intended to help with scheduling employee training sessions.
"It was always difficult to get everybody off the phone at the same time to hold a training session," explains Kaman president Steve Smidler. Someone at the branch level needed to be available to answer incoming calls. Since installation of the VoIP system at all of the company's 184 locations was completed last June, calls from one branch can be temporarily transferred to another designated branch within the phone network.
"We can block out two hours over lunch to hold a training session and all of the calls will roll over to another location in the network so the customer can be taken care of," Smidler says.
In addition to the scheduling benefits, the system proved especially useful during two major weather emergencies this year. For example, when Hurricane Irene knocked out power at nine Kaman locations in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Virginia last August, not a single call was missed.
"We rerouted 1,350 calls a day, allowing customers in the affected areas to reach a live service representative immediately," said Arti Patel, Kaman marketing projects manager. Although it took nearly two weeks for all locations to be placed back into service, customers were not impacted by the branch closings.
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Power to the people The company provided the generators to employees at cost. |
More recently, when an unusual autumn storm dumped record amounts of snow and left more than 2.3 million utility customers from Pennsylvania to New England without power for several days, Kaman managed again to successfully field all incoming customer calls.
"We've got flexibility with our phone system so that even if a branch is closed down, our customer service person can go into another branch and log in and their phone number follows them to anywhere in our company," says Smidler.
If impassable roads prevent an employee from making it into work, incoming calls can be routed to another CSR with no interruption in service. Should a customer call to place an order or make an inquiry, the CSR fielding the call can quickly pull up details about the status of the caller's order.
"The customer won't even know the call is being rerouted; they won't even know the branch was down," says Smidler.
Smidler explains that the Kaman operating system is set up around customer networks, not around individual branches. "In addition to the phone system, we've been changing our work flow and process to make sure we're not dependent solely on what happens in the branch," Smidler says.
So, the next time Mother Nature wreaks havoc on any part of the country, customers can focus on digging out from the storm, but they won't have to worry about the status of their Kaman orders.
INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY MAGAZINE
The May/June issue of Industrial Supply magazine features an in-depth cover story about GHX Industrial. Plus, we're featuring articles by contributing writers Dr. Bharani Nagarathnam and Frank Hurtte, as well as interviews with numerous product and distribution industry experts.
