Financial firms have shifted call centre investment from systems to staff training, according to research by the Ion Group.
The study surveyed marketing professionals from the UK's top 500 companies and asked about key investment areas over the next year. Respondents in the banking industry viewed automated call handling and agent support systems as a low priority, but saw staff training as a fundamental investment focus.
The Ion Group says there has been widespread take-up of technology for call centres and the banking industry is now looking to extract maximum value by investing in the call centre agent.
Graham Ede, managing director, Ion Group, comments: "In this high value sector, call centre agents really do need to be both skilled and knowledgeable in order to bring the call to a useful commercial outcome."
"For banks who have high lifetime value customers, the cost of having a well trained, highly skilled live agent on the phone pales into insignificance if the customer's lifetime value is going to add up to tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of pounds," adds Ede.