Last month, RingCentral teamed up with UC Today to run CC Expo: Virtually Together. This virtual expo focussed on the practical applications of cloud communications and contact centre and the tangible benefits they can bring to businesses.

In one session Andy Conolly, IT Service and Operation Manager at Costa Express, described his biggest challenge in moving the company’s customer communications to the cloud.

Lessons from the past

About a year ago, Costa Express was still tied to a legacy on-premises telephone system. The company recognised the need to move to a more resilient setup. Andy’s previous experience with cloud systems led him to recommend Costa Express find a solution that allowed employees to work from anywhere in the world without having to worry about VPNs or hardware and maintenance. The ideal solution would deliver simple access to a flexible and scalable global system.

In the past, Costa Express had experienced some severe problems with their on-premises system when heavy rains led to water leaks, forcing them to switch off the power to the whole office building. That meant employees weren’t able to make and receive calls, and weren’t even able to update the phone system to inform customers that they were experiencing technical difficulties.

 

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Flexibility a necessity

With this previous experience in mind, Costa Express recognised the need for a system with in-built flexibility that would enable employees to quickly and easily start working remotely, should the need arise. In Andy’s words, “The days of being able to stock a contact centre all in one building, all with physical handsets – those days have gone.”

As Andy describes, businesses need to be flexible in how they work with employees and also in how they respond to customers. An important consideration in switching to a new system was that it should enable employees to continue to offer a high level of service to customers no matter what happens to the business.

In this interview, Andy takes us through the transition process from the old on-premises to the new cloud system. The discussion highlights the preparation and support delivered by the RingCentral professional services team to ensure a seamless transition.

Moving the company’s phone and contact centre system to the cloud opened up a wealth of new possibilities. Andy was able to implement a big chunk of automation to the customer service operation. This automation, combined with a reduction in the number of collaboration tools being relied on, represented a huge amount of direct savings to Costa Express.

Interview in full

If you’d like to hear the Costa Express story in detail, you can watch the full interview here: