Information Systems used to Support the Business Process Some of the business processes that Time Warner Cable uses are a Virtual Call Center, and outsourcing of jobs to Costa Rica and the Philippines. With both of these processes Time Warner Cable can save money and better assist the customer. Virtual Call Center Time Warner Cable started using a Virtual call in 2007. In Wisconsin Time Warner Cable had two divisions Northeast Wisconsin, which was the Green Bay, Fox Cities, Marinette, and Northern Michigan. In the southern part of Wisconsin was another division Southeast Wisconsin, which consisted of the greater Milwaukee area.
With the use of a Virtual Call Center Time Warner Cable could combine both divisions into one division. Any customer who calls into Time Warner Cable in the Wisconsin area is sent to the first available Customer Care representative in the north or south. The virtual call center works with Voice over IP and employees can be in any part of the state. The Advantages of this type of system are that the company can save money by having more employees in a lower cost of living environment. Time Warner Cable has merged two call centers into one. In the Appleton area the cost of living is cheaper than the cost of living in Milwaukee.
The same amount of people can be hired in the Appleton area to help with the workload at a cheaper rate than hiring the same amount of people in the Milwaukee area. Another benefit of a Virtual Call Center is redundancy. If something were to happen at one of the call centers the other call center could take over until the problem was solved. If one area has a snow storm and employees cannot make it into work or cannot make it to work on time the other call center can take the calls and the customer will not notice the difference. Other advantages are that employees can work from anywhere.
No longer is the need to have an employee be at the office for eight hours a day. Employees can be given secure computers that can log into the corporate network to perform their job with the same resources that an employee has at the office. Employees can work at home saving money on gas and time traveling. The disadvantages to a virtual call center are that the company now relies on the network to be fully functional for all employees to work. If the network is not reliable employees will not be able to work and will not be able to communicate with the main call center.
Another disadvantage could be that an employee who is working from home will be harder to manage by his or her supervisor or boss. Without a boss or supervisor around the employee may be prone not to work as hard. Outsourcing Jobs Time Warner Cable outsources jobs to help with the amount of calls that comes into the call center. Time Warner outsources jobs to Costa Rica and to the Philippines. Billing and general cable television support is outsourced to Costa Rica, and Tier two or level two Internet support is outsourced to the Philippines.
The Advantages of outsourcing are that Time Warner cable can now hire more employees at a cheaper rate. With the use of an IP-based virtual call center Time Warner cable can now contract employees from all over the word at a cheaper rate than hiring employees in the United States. A disadvantage to outsourcing jobs to other countries is the language barrier that the customer must face. It may be harder for the customer to understand the representative that he or she may be talking with. This can cause frustration for the customer and potently leave a bad taste in the customer’s mouth.
Outsourcing jobs also takes away jobs locally. With more jobs being outsourced at a cheaper rate people locally have the possibility of losing their jobs to a cheaper alternative overseas. A Virtual Call Center and outsourcing jobs has its advantages and disadvantages for Time Warner Cable and their customers. The advantages of using a Virtual Call Center and Outsourcing outweigh the disadvantages. With the process in place over the next few years Time Warner Cable will expand into two divisions an east division and a west division. Expanding the divisions will be possible with the use of outsourcing and the Virtual Call Center.
