We tackled massive call volumes by introducing a cloud-based voice automation system, allowing customers to renew insurance cards through natural speech recognition.
CLIENT
NHS Business Services Authority
INDUSTRY
Healthcare
SERVICE
Contact Centre
The client
The EHIC, which provides UK holidaymakers reassurance that their healthcare costs are covered if they fall ill while travelling in Europe, is an extremely popular service.
The challenges
While most companies have a set customer base about which much information is known, NHSBSA's customer base is the whole of the UK population. Therefore, it must consistently forecast calls from potentially over 60 million people, making it difficult to allocate resources.
As EHIC cards need to be reviewed every five years, NHSBSA's contact centre was receiving a consistently high volume of calls from an average of 300,000 customers needing new cards per month. Within the peak months, there were as many as 2 million calls received. This presented a considerable challenge to answer all inbound calls by using call centre agents alone.
The call centre was previously unable to deal effectively with such unpredictable spikes in call volume, particularly due to most calls handled were the more routine and straightforward application requests, so agents had less time to respond to more complex and detailed customer calls.
After consultation with NHSBSA, Nasstar determined that any successful solution would need the ability to handle a high volume of calls, extend the hours for customer service beyond the contact centre’s opening hours, deliver significant cost savings, and facilitate a more agile and effective customer experience.
Our goal
The outcome
The digital transformation of NHSBSA’s inbound call process has made EHIC applications simpler and more efficient for both customers and agents, streamlining the overall service journeys.
With automation reducing reliance on human agents, NHSBSA can now handle significantly more calls. Nasstar’s flexible infrastructure allows services to scale up or down based on demand, with capacity limited only by bandwidth and system resources.
By automating routine EHIC enquiries, averaging 4,000 calls, staff are freed up to focus on more complex customer needs and professional development, including training and skill-building.
The cloud-based voice recognition system has enabled NHSBSA to save approximately £700,000 over three years, with potential savings of up to 70% per transaction when fully automated, a figure that continues to grow.
"It was very important for us to be able to work closely with a supplier who would continue to monitor and make improvements to the system, even after deployment. We were delighted with the system from day one, and yet we have benefited from further refinements ever since. We are confident that the system will continue to improve efficiency."
Brendan Brown
Head of Operational and Shared Services
•NHS Business Services Authority
