Product News March 2005

VOICELOG ANNOUNCES TOTAL SCRIPT CONTROL FOR LIVE AGENT VERIFICATION

VoiceLog LLC, a provider of third-party verification, has announced the availability of Total Script Control for its live agent verification services.

Using advanced speech-recognition technology, Total Script Control analyzes the recordings of up to 100 percent of VoiceLog TPV transactions to determine if the agent asked all required questions. Calls that don’t match the required script are flagged for review by a live quality control supervisor and corrective action is taken. In addition, a summary report is provided to clients showing the level of script compliance on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.

Script compliance is a critical element for third-party verification; failure to ask the required questions can result in fines levied by the FCC or state PUCs.

To introduce Total Script Control, VoiceLog is offering a free script compliance audit for companies using other live agent TPV providers. VoiceLog will process copies of a company’s TPV recordings and provide a free report showing the level of script compliance. The offer is open to all live agent TPV users with a minimum daily average of 50 calls.

VOICELOG LLC
8904 Old Gate Lane
Rockville, MD 20852
+1 301 230 2129
www.voicelog.com

ARGUS ADDS MODULES TO DC POWER PRODUCT LINE

Argus Technologies, which makes DC power solutions for the communications industry, has added two modules to its Cordex rectifier product line. Argus has augmented its Cordex family with a 125DC and 220VDC 1.1kW module, as well as the Cordex 3.1kW rectifier.

The Cordex 1.1kW rectifiers are designed for the DC powering needs of applications including large utility, petrochemical and industrial installations. The 1.1kWs compact design makes room for six rectifiers in a 19-inch shelf, Argus says. It also is convectioncooled, given the dusty environments where the power systems often are used. Argus says the 1.1kW rectifier was developed to recharge all types of stationary batteries. Both of the Cordex 1.1kW modules work with the Cordex CXC system controller.

Similarly, the new Cordex 3.1kW rectifier is packed with 130A at 24VDC. Argus is targeting wireless providers with the 4RU design, multicarrier power amplifiers and 24VDC wireless base station applications. The module can be configured to a variety of shelf sizes. For example, a 23-inch shelf accommodates six rectifiers for 18.6kW; a 19-inch shelf accommodates five rectifiers or 15.5kW total output.

All Cordex rectifiers are designed with features that include power limiting, wide range AC input, power factor correction, and hot swapability with Ethernet communications.

ARGUS TECHNOLOGIES
5700 Sidley St.
Burnaby, BC Canada V5J 5E5
+1 604 436 5900
www.argus.ca

CONTROL POINT ENHANCES REPORTING INTERFACE

Control Point Solutions has announced new enhancements for carrier Web reporting, revenue assurance, margin management and benchmarking. The company has created a new reporting interface and portal called Control Center, which lets users select standard reports, pre-schedule reports and design customized reports.

The company says it also is expanding revenue assurance, margin management and benchmarking capabilities.

Control Point Solutions was formed in August 2004 by the merger of Broadmargin and Teldata Control. It is a telecom spending management firm; the company had more than $7 billion in spending under management at the time of the merger. The company helps executives address issues including margin improvement, spending for specific services and vendors and more.

CONTROL POINT SOLUTIONS 201 Route 17 N.
Rutherford, NJ 07070
+1 201 933 2200
www.controlpointsolutions.com

INFO DIRECTIONS UNVEILS COSTGUARD.NET 8.03

Info Directions Inc. has released the latest version of the CostGuard.NET platform for billing and order management, which includes improvements in the customer care, account management, reporting and taxation areas. Version 8.03 is available as a hosted or onsite solution.

The new features were developed with an eye to streamlining operations and improving functionality for facilities-based service providers, resellers and convergent carriers.

For instance, the enhanced trouble ticket feature incorporates user defined attributes and facilitates automated activities through its integration with system workflows and task plans. Trouble tickets can be assigned to particular users or groups of users and can be escalated as needed, standalone trouble tickets can be issued for ‘non-customers’ and the system can capture the carrier and reference number for external tickets. Users can tag tickets as ‘internal’ to suppress them during the reporting process; automatically update the technician history to see who has worked a ticket and for how long; and ‘park’ tickets, capturing the reason and length of time for the hold. To tie together multiple, related trouble tickets, CostGuard.NET also offers parent/child trouble tickets that record the resolution and allow all the children to be closed when the parent is closed. Ad hoc searching and the ability to duplicate trouble tickets also now is included.

To support facilities-based service providers, the new version of the platform offers a comprehensive number inventory capability and reporting functionality for Numbering Resource Utilization/Forecast (NRUF) as required under the North American Numbering Plan. CostGuard.NET tracks the pools of numbers assigned to a service provider, helps forecast projected exhaust dates and provides a report that service providers can use to file their biannual NRUF updates with the North American Numbering Plan Administration.

Additional new features in this release include taxes on click-tocredit, so service providers can issue credits including the taxes that were in effect at the time the usage item was billed.

Suspend/restore and hotlining offers wireline service providers wizards to make it easier to manage accounts and suspend/restore service in bulk. For wireless providers, hotlining redirects calls to customer support when phone service termination is denied for circumstances including reported theft or credit limit overages.

CostGuard.NET also now tells customer service representatives how many free minutes a customer has remaining, for both past and current billing periods.

INFO DIRECTIONS INC.
833 Phillips Road
Victor, NY 14564
+1 888 924 4110
www.infodirections.com

TMI OFFERS NEW ELECTRONIC PUBLICATIONS

Technologies Management Inc., a regulatory consulting firm for telecommunications providers, announced it now offers expanded electronic publications to help carriers comply with consumer obligations imposed by states and the FCC.

Among the expanded publications is TMI’s “Credit, Billing and Disconnection Rules Handbook,” which provides essential information on how to bill and collect for services provided by local, toll and operator services companies.

Providing this vital information in a streamlined electronic handbook enables users to locate and utilize important billing language, disconnection rules and other consumer-specific billing issues in a fraction of the time it ordinarily would take.

Other expanded publications now in electronic form include: “Lifeline/Link Up Participation Requirements,” “Preferred Carrier Change Requirements,” “Recurring Customer Notice Requirements,” “Tariff Filing Intervals” and “Customer Notice Requirements Guide.”

TECHNOLOGIES MANAGEMENT INC.
210 N. Park Ave.
Winter Park, FL 32789
+1 407 740 8575
www.tminc.com

SOUNDBITE HELPS CARRIERS UPSELL

SoundBite  Communications, an interactive voice messaging ASP, is helping carriers and cable and broadband companies better market to and upsell subscribers with its new Web-hosted program, SoundBite 5.0 for Telecommunications.

Using subscriber contact information, SoundBite creates automated messages best suited for those targets. SoundBite then sends messages over wireline or wireless phones, or via e-mail or text messaging. Different messages can go to live recipients and answering machines.

SoundBite keeps track of subscribers’ responses to the disseminated messages, which carriers and other companies can use for marketing and upselling.

SoundBite 5.0 for Telecommunications does not require hardware or software and is available on a pay-as-you-go basis.

The new version features OnDemand Blended Suppression, which blocks a phone number or a group of numbers from being called. There also is OnDemand Enterprise Support so organizations can create, manage and report on their SoundBite campaigns on a company-wide basis. Finally, Campaign Management and Reporting allows companies to manage calling campaigns over the Web, in real time, and obtain real-time results.

The platform also includes answering machine detection, which eliminates hangups on a live person and clipped messages on answering machines. The Direct Connect feature gives call recipients the option to connect directly to a live agent, and the Load Balancing feature lets outbound calls automatically adjust to control the influx of calls to the call center.

SoundBite 5.0 for Telecommunications also delivers qualified inbound calls to agents and integrates with infrastructure such as ACDs and CRM.

SOUNDBITE COMMUNICATIONS INC.
3 Burlington Woods Drive
Burlington, MA 01803
+1 781 273 3360
www.soundbite.com

AGILENT, AZURE AID PROVIDER REPORTING

Service providers looking for a way to accurately report revenue and comply with legislation such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act have another option now that Agilent Technologies Inc. and Azure Solutions have agreed to jointly market some of their products.

Together, the companies are marketing Azure’s Certo Revenue Assurance platform and Agilent’s acceSS7 monitoring system, offering providers the means to identify and correct usage-data errors throughout a revenue life cycle. The companies say the effort also helps providers meet the stringent reporting requirements of federal legislation.

Agilent’s acceSS7 network monitoring system captures, stores and enriches signaling system 7 (SS7) records of all network transactions for voice and data services. Azure’s Certo platform and revenue assurance applications will use the signaling records as reference for actual service usage. This gives service providers data accuracy as they process network transactions across the revenue chain, the companies say.

The Certo platform automatically detects and corrects data integrity errors that cause revenue leakage, and incur unnecessary costs and customer dissatisfaction. The results, says Azure, are increased profitability and confidence in financial reporting. The platform works for wireline, wireless and broadband networks.

AGILENT TECHNOLOGIES INC.
395 Page Mill Road
Palo Alto, CA 94306
+1 877 424 4536
www.agilent.com

AZURE SOLUTIONS
10385 Westmoor Drive, #205
Westminster, CO 80021
+1 303 301 6200
www.azuresolutions.com