Over the last ten years, the concept of business consolidation is being widely accepted and embraced by multiple companies of different sectors. Bringing similar functions under one roof reduces superfluous processes while improving operational efficiency. Also, it ensures better management of cash, and FX, and helps one take constructive financial decisions. However, often, due to the lack of capital, infrastructure, manpower and knowledge, the idea of centralization doesn’t get turned into reality. This is when certain functions can be outsourced to BPOs or call centers. The services offered by BPOs help under-resourced companies cut costs and add value to the existing services. Companies trading in the BFSI(banking, financial services and insurance) sector, like in all others, often, feel the need of opting for BPO services to streamline their offerings. Since the financial services and products are constantly expanding, outsourcing certain functions to reputed BPOs can turn out to be quite beneficial.
Many banks, finance and insurance-providing institutions use BPO services to aid account activities and business acquisition services, associated with the customer’s banking lifecycle. Financial institutions mostly choose to outsource operations like customer services, HR services, training services etc. They often reach out to BPOs for new customer acquisition processes like telemarketing, application processing, customer or merchant credit evaluation, credit approval, underwriting, document processing, account opening and customer care activities. Back-office operations like payment processing systems and customer services like email or voice services are all taken care of, by a BPO. Financial institutions outsource non-strategic functions like customer services to a company with abundant technical knowledge, professional staff, considerable industry experience and the skill of effectively communicating with customers with the voice as well as non-voice processes, to ensure outputs of optimum quality, and save money.
Primary Benefits Of Outsourcing Customer Services:
- Outsourcing customer services help companies get the job(customer management) done by skilled professionals with considerable experience in the particular field. This makes sure the generated output is error-free. When the companies no longer need to use resources, time and brains on these non-strategic tasks, they are left with enough time to focus on the core operations. Also, it provides great relief for the staff and enables customers to contact agents proficient in solving queries.
- It is often a less expensive alternative to hiring full-time in-house customer service staff, whom the company is obligated to pay monthly remuneration along with overtime charges, during peak seasons, and other employee benefits. Outsourcing the customer service team can allow the BFSI institution to experience financial relief by saving on SG&A, software licensing and agent attrition costs. Some outsourcers even offer flexible and budget-friendly staffing options along with a convenient price structure, that charges per resolution.
- In today’s fast-paced world, customers opt for banks or financial institutions that promise prompt after-hour and weekend support via online chat, email and social media. Reputed BPOs with many skilled customer support teams working in multiple shifts throughout the day and night enable BFSI institutions to make sure no customer goes unattended due to the unavailability of customer care agents.
- Surveys on the consumer psyche say that 50-51% of the customers won’t turn back to companies that ignored them once. A higher number of agents can assure a noticeable reduction in response time. Eventually, the prompt, 24×7 customer support builds a sense of trust among the customers and helps the company build reputation in the BFSI industry.
- Outsourcing customer services to foreign countries can widen the customer base, of a company, by adding more language options.
- Giant outsourcers or call centers have access to the latest technologies, comprising software and computer programs, VPNs, modern computing terminals and networking hardware, finely-honed chatbot setups and many other, that might not be in the of the BFSI company.
Summary
Customer services play a vital role in convincing customers about a brand. Companies, no matter how big they are, can indeed lose valued customers due to poor customer service. A business can only run and expand when it has a considerable number of loyal customers, and that tends to steadily increase. Therefore, no business can afford to lose them, especially in today’s competitive business climate, where other companies are always waiting for the right opportunity to establish a stronger foothold in the industry. This is when BFSI companies need to outsource customer services to increase the standards of their services and appease their treasured customers.
