Empowering Contact Center Agents to Work Securely and Scalably from Home with Airkit

We’ve grown used to technology solving incredibly complex problems instantly. When we have to wait an extra second or two for our phones to load driving directions, stream a movie, or answer an extremely pressing question like, “What song is this?” it feels like a massive inconvenience. We’re all accustomed to the blazing pace of technology and often expect it to solve pretty much any challenge we face or request we have immediately. 

But there’s one hurdle that Fortune 500 companies, multinational brands, and global enterprises face which technology can’t overcome on its own. That challenge is creating an empathetic and frictionless journey for customers who might have fallen behind on bills to allow them to seamlessly catch up. This requires compassion to protect and preserve customer relationships, engineering to build these digital interactions, and adherence to complex financial regulations.

Meet ERC

ERC is a specialist in this arena, and they work to deliver exceptional customer experiences through a mix of amazing people and leading technology. They know the scope of the work they do is often too big or too complex for their clients to fit into one wing of the office or one department in their org chart. As a result, ERC often works within a company’s infrastructure or on behalf of a company to run business process outsourcing and collections.

As the global pandemic changed the world, and the way the world works, ERC found themselves having to account for new variables in an already complex ecosystem. They wanted to empower their contact center agents to work from home, which meant ensuring that those agents were performing their jobs securely and scalably. 

On the collections side of business, much of ERC’s expertise revolves around capturing customers’ highly sensitive payment information to settle outstanding bills and reconcile debts. Everyday, ERC collects hundreds of thousands of dollars on behalf of the companies they work for. To quickly adapt to a new remote work environment and maintain tight security controls around customer financial information, ERC looked to Airkit. 

Building 100% PCI-Compliant Customer Journeys

Using Airkit, ERC was able to empower their workforce across the globe to not only work remotely but also work much more efficiently—a feat they accomplished in just a few weeks. 

With their new Airkit integration, ERC’s agents cut down on call handle time and improved their CSAT. Now, instead of asking for credit card details over the phone, agents can send a secure link via text or email to the customer.

From there, the customer can go through that payment flow in just a few short steps with the agent on the line to answer questions they might have along the way. Any payment information that customer inputs as part of that flow is captured on Airkit’s PCI-compliant platform and sent securely to a payment processor immediately. 

Onto the Next CX

The ERC team built this new, 100% PCI-compliant flow with the help of Airkit’s team in a matter of weeks, shortening the development cycle by 9x. It also works within ERC’s homegrown infrastructure as well as their clients’ bespoke infrastructure, meaning ERC can use Airkit anywhere and doesn’t have to train agents on two sets of software or waste time switching contexts.

“We see a ton of products on the market and when we reviewed the Airkit platform we were very impressed. This solution allowed us to move quickly and provide better experiences for us and our clients without the heavy burden of technology resources,” said Marty Sarim, ERC’s CEO.

Today, the ERC team is working on building even more Airkit-powered customer journeys to help their clients unlock the power of Airkit in their business. You can learn more about the ERC story here.