In the Spotlight: Home Group

Background

Home Group is a housing association, social enterprise and charity and is one of the UK’s largest providers of housing and integrated housing, health and social care. Operating for more than 80 years, the Home Group supports over 125,000 customers who live in more than 55,000 homes across England and Scotland. In addition, during the last year, the group has worked with over 12,000 vulnerable people in its supported housing and health services.

Challenge

Home Group was facing challenges in its contact centre due to its former Workforce Management (WFM) tool reaching the end of its serviceable life. With the contact centre growing to 150 seats, the original solution was no longer fit for purpose, and therefore Gavin Rogerson, resource planning manager, was focused on identifying a solution that would meet the needs of the organisation, both in the present and future.

Solution

Home Group selected Business Systems to implement the cloud-based Calabrio ONE WFM solution. It was recommended by Business Systems due to its forecasting, scheduling, and analytics capabilities, which were essential for optimising resource allocation and enhancing operational performance.

Results

• Over £16,000 in savings each month 
• ROI in 6 months 
• 12 percent increase in achievement of calls answered 
• 20 percent increase in scheduling efficiencies 
• Saved on 5 new hires 
• 40 admin hours saved per week 

Home Group said it has not only modernised its resource planning capabilities but also achieved substantial financial and operational benefits, including monthly financial savings of £16,000, and a 12 percent increase in the number of calls answered and responses to digital channels within the target Service Level Agreement. A 20 percent increase in scheduling efficiencies has also been recorded, in addition to saving 40 administrative hours per week.

Within six months of implementation, Home Group has achieved a return on investment (ROI), surpassing the two-year target that was originally envisioned with a project of this scale.

With the ability to monitor contact centre activities and resources in one place, it is creating significant efficiencies when compared to the former manual approach. Real-time data now provides managers with a single, unified view of the contact centre’s operations while workforce planners can create fast, efficient schedules at the click of a button. 

“Our goal has always been to provide the best end user experience – it might be a bit of a cliché but happy colleagues equal happy customers. We want our people to be happy, we want them to know where they’re at and this solution, which is so easy to use, helps us achieve this,” said Rogerson. 

“We went from effectively pen and paper, to a state-of-the-art digital solution. We have seen our average speed of call answering improve, and now have far greater visibility than before.”