Patent · US Expired

Agent vectoring programmably conditionally assigning agents to various tasks including tasks other than handling of waiting calls

US5721770A · kind A · utility

237Cited by
5References
16Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventor

Key dates

Filing dateJul 2, 1996
Grant dateFeb 24, 1998
Priority date
Expiry dateJul 2, 2016

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04M2203/402
  • WIPO fieldTelecommunications
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

An ACD system (101) is programmable by an operator of the ACD system to automatically change the work of a call center agent (106-108) in order to maximize the agent's productivity and to provide a variety of work balanced with "breather" time in order to prevent agent burn-out. The conditions for changing the agent's work and the agent's alternative duties when the conditions are met are both programmed by the operator via a vectoring capability (150) of the ACD system and a scripting language (FIGS. 2-23) for defining the vectors. When an agent becomes available to handle a call from a particular call queue (121-129), the agent's corresponding vector is executed, and the conditions specified by the vector are checked against the present status of the call center to determine if they are met. If the conditions are not met, the agent is caused to handle a call from the particular call queue. But if the conditions are met, the agent is caused to perform a function specified by the vector, other than handing a call from the particular call queue, even though a call may be waiting for an available agent in that call queue.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.