NSL provides a comms experience for Upsher Heating that stops customers going cold

The Customer

The Challenge

Upsher Heating previously only had a single phone line into the reception desk, before buying out a competitor that used both analogue and VoIP lines. Post-acquisition, Scott decided to split the lines between his residential and commercial teams, but it never really worked as expected, as calls would still be charged as if calling a completely external number.

He also found more inconsistencies, dropped calls and audio quality issues on the VoIP lines, where he’d be forced to raise tickets and hope a solution would come soon, but could take up to a week!

For example, customers started reporting engaged tones, due to a 3rd line that was redirecting from the VoIP line back to the analogue line. This meant customers weren’t getting through to make their queries, sometimes being directed to the answerphone, resulting in lost revenue opportunities and unsatisfied customers!

Scott had met Leicester, NSL’s Business Development Manager from a previous business networking group and reached out to see if NSL could solve their growing telephony issues.

The Solution

As soon as possible, Leicester made the effort to visit Scott and the team, to demo the 8×8 platform, and show him the extensive self-serve capabilities and usability of the system, with Scott immediately convinced it would be the perfect platform for the team!

Working with Scott to understand the various needs of each of Upsher’s teams – from engineers to admin staff, the solution would be designed so all calls came into one of three numbers.

Several members of the admin team weren’t as technically savvy as others, and were used to having their traditional desk phones, so NSL included a combination of softphones and deskphones in the solution design to ensure all admin staff had a solution they were comfortable with using.

8×8’s Instant Messaging platform would also remove the need for the majority of internal calls, with engineers installing the 8×8 app on their mobiles, so that they could log in-and-out of call queues when necessary, for example when on-call overnight, or attending a site visit. Scott could even get rid of his previous ‘work phone’ as he could separate his personal and work numbers using the 8×8 app on his personal mobile!

After testing the solution, NSL trained all employees in 1 day, before switching calls to the new system at the end of the day, while incoming calls were forwarded to the on-call numbers to ensure absolutely no downtime at all.

“The support’s been great, and I can’t fault Leicester and the NSL team. They’ve helped modernise our telephony and give us the tools we need to be smarter in how we work. It’s already helped us capture opportunities that would have been missed and prevent customer churn while saving us money, so we’d recommend them to anyone in a similar situation!”

Scott Clarke, Owner, Upsher Heating

The Results

Now, the entire Upsher Heating team can enjoy a seamless communications system, where calls can seamlessly be transferred between the residential and commercial teams where necessary, and all internal calls are free, reducing costs significantly compared to the previous solution.

On-call engineers using 8×8’s mobile app no longer have to share their personal numbers, ensuring GDPR compliance and, thanks to the file management functionality within 8×8, can quickly access the files required to perform their on-site tasks. They can also log in and log out of on-call queues after office hours to ensure calls go directly to those who need to receive them for a more consistent and streamlined customer experience.

These efforts have already made a difference to Upsher Heating and its customers as a loyal customer called one Fri evening, with the on-call engineer seeing the call come through on the app out of hours, answering it directly before going out to solve the issues. On the previous system the call would have been left to the answerphone and picked up the next Monday, possibly leading the customer to look elsewhere for immediate support.

And now that the foundational solution is established and optimised, Scott is working with Leicester and the NSL team to explore 8×8’s reporting and analytics functionalities to further improve internal processes and find new ways to evolve the customer experience.