Open Communication with Your Business Answering Service is a Must

Businesses that utilize the invaluable benefits of a business answering service may sometimes forget to relay important information to their virtual receptionists. Sometimes, we do such a great job at keeping your business communications running smoothly, business owners forget to keep us in the loop with important announcements or changes.

We wanted to take the time to remind you of the top 5 ways you can make sure your answering service is in synch with your in-house team.                                                                                                        

What you should be communicating to your business answering service  

1. Change in business hours or holiday vacation schedules.

The winter season is flooded with changes to our customers’ hours of operation. Our number one goal is to keep your callers happily informed and satisfied. As such, we appreciate a friendly call from you giving us any changes to your opening/closing hours, days you will be closed for the holidays and specific protocols for your customers to follow.

Need some examples of when to notify your virtual receptionists of specific holiday changes? No problem! Call us if:

• • You will be closed for the three-day Thanksgiving holiday and when you will resume normal business hours.

• • Your retails shops or eCommerce web stores will be open longer for Black Friday or Cyber Monday.

• • You will be recognizing Christmas, Chanukah or other special holiday hours of operation.

• • Your office will be closing early for New Year’s Eve or closed all of New Year’s Day.

• • You have on-call services available and specific procedures for your customers to follow for after-hour or emergency service calls.   

2. New additions to the staff or company policies.

Just like you would provide an in-house receptionist updated extension or employee lists, your business answering serviceneeds the same information. Keeping us up to date with your employee and department changes allow us to represent your office to the best of our ability.

So when someone is calling your customer service department and asks for Lisa but Lisa is no longer with your company, we can professionally respond, “Sara is actually the customer service lead that will be able to assist you with your inquiry today. May I forward you through to Sara’s extension so you can discuss your situation with her in more detail?”

Likewise, if you have changes to your company policy we can update your account with answers to your callers’ frequently asked questions. Many of our customers love our ability to fully customize their account to include specific answers to FAQ’s. Our customer service assistance allows your in-house staff to focus on more productive work while we assist your callers in real time with lower priority tasks.     

3. Increase in prices, fees and rates.

As the end of year approaches, you may be adopting new or increased prices for 2016. It is encouraged to remain competitive with your prices but it is natural to account for inflation, technology upgrades and/or increase in staff size.

Many of our clients take advantage of our customization features and allow us to quote their fees and prices upfront to potential customers. Keep your virtual receptionists informed so that we can relay changes in rates to your callers before setting any appointments or service calls on your behalf.

Remember, the more you communicate with us the better we can communicate with your callers.   

4. New promotions, specials or discount programs.

Have you spent some of your marketing budget to advertise special holiday promotions, specials or discounts? Allow us to make sure your callers know the details of your marketing efforts by supplying us with the specifics of any campaign you are running.

Here at A Courteous Communications, it is forbidden for any of our virtual receptionists to say, “I don’t know, we are just the answering service.” We are whatever our clients need us to be and by keeping us informed and educated with any discounts being offered, we can assist your callers with A+ customer service.   

5. Changes to your on-call personnel directory.

If you continue to run your business operations throughout the holiday season, we will ask you for names and contact phone numbers for your on-call personnel. Customize your staff call list and make sure that each calendar day is accounted for within your internal after-hour staff.

For example, if you are a 24-hour electrician company and you have two service technicians that will be responsible for handling after-hour or holiday service calls; we can customize your account fully. If Tom will be the first on-call technician for Thanksgiving and Ed will be the on-call technician for Christmas, we have the scheduling software capabilities to program your account to reflect these details.

Supply your virtual receptionist team with your on-call personnel specific schedules and contact information so your after-hour calls are streamlined and as efficient as possible.

Give our business answering service a call, day or night, with your account changes.

Being a professional business answering service requires that we have a team available for these kinds of holiday changes and updates to your account, 24 hours a day. That’s right, just give us a call at 1-800-785-6161, day or night, and speak with an account or programming specialist to have your changes made in real time.