In the space of nearly five months, the Next Generation Contact Centre (NGCC) has helped the Council become more responsive.

According to Ian Whitelaw, Customer and Business Support Team Leader, and Council of the Future NGCC Project Manager, the Council invested £120,000 in “state-of-the-art contact centre telephony”.

He said: “We asked for the best and that’s what we got and we’re at the tip of the iceberg with its capabilities.”

But what can the NGCC do over and above answer phone calls and respond to emails? Most importantly - it can work anywhere in the world, 24/7 on any device.

“When the Beast from the East struck, staff had to find a way to get into the contact centre because the phones still needed to be answered, especially for MECS,” Ian said. “Once the MECS’ Arc – the call receiving centre for the button and box – is given the green light to transfer to a digital platform, we hope it will be fully integrated into the NGCC and we’ll never be in that situation again. We’ll be able to answer calls wherever we are, on whatever device we have available to us at that time.”

Being cloud-based also means the NGCC is future proof, so it’s unlikely to become obsolete, and all software updates are automatic, meaning the system keeps pace with technological advances in telephony.

Ian added: “Natural language is potentially going to come on board soon. This will eliminate the need for numerical options when you call the Council; instead people will simply say which service they want and be directly connected at no cost.

“The next step is to integrate the NGCC with My Falkirk, which will provide the big picture regarding how customers interact with the Council. We’d then be able to see everything on one master board. No matter if a customer calls in, comes into an office or contacts us online, their interaction will be managed in one central place - the linchpin of customer service delivery.”