Questions and Answers

If you would like to submit a question please use our online Enquiry Form

Is there an entry fee?

No! The North East Contact Centre Awards are FREE to enter for all.

Is there a limit to the number of entries an organisation can submit per category?

No, there is no limit to the number of entries organisations can submit for each category, except for categories 9 and 10 which are limited to one entry per stand alone site.

I am looking at promoting the Awards within our contact centre, is it possible for me to use the Awards logo on in-house promotion?

Yes that is fine, please send us your email address and we will forward the logo on to your for internal use.

Are pull quotes and diagrams used in the main body of an application included in the word count?

The use of pull quotes and diagrams or charts does not count in the word limit of the submission. These quotes should be succinct however, emphasising a particular point made in the submission. Where large, unedited chunks of quotation are used, these may be counted in the main body.

Are call recordings an essential requirement of supporting evidence as we would not be able to supply these under data protection laws?

Yes but only for category 1. We are fully aware of data protection laws and we'd expect call recordings to be supplied in accordance with those laws i.e. without personal details. In the past, all call recordings we've received have been edited so the customer is in no way identifiable. This is usually achieved via editing the WAV or sometimes the recording only starts say 15 seconds into the call once customer identification is complete. Where a contact centre is unable to edit or record the calls in this way, then we may be able to look at alternatives.

The purpose of the call recording approach, is to really give the advisers the best chance to succeed, as what we want to judge is their ability to manage customer interactions day to day, rather than under pressure because a judge is sitting next to them in a quite unique scenario.

Is it possible to request additional application packs to distribute within our organisation?

Yes, just let us know how many application packs you require and we will be happy to post them out to you.

Are testimonials included in the word count?

If testimonials are required as part of the judging criteria they will be included in your total word count. We would suggest a way of getting around this would be to include one or two good examples as part of the main body of your application and then include more testimonials in the appendices, making sure you cross reference this so the judges know where to look.

How strict are the word limits?

Individual categories (1 to 5) are limited to 1500 words, team categories (5 to 8) are limited to 2000 words and contact centre of the year categories (9 & 10) are limited to 2500 words. There is a 10% tolerance on these limits. There is no word limit on the supporting evidence that can be submitted.

What is the deadline for applications?

The deadline for all applications is Friday 16th September 2011. All completed applications should be accompanied by an Awards entry form (which can be found at the back of the application pack) which must be signed by the nominee's proposer.r.

Can you advise what is the period that supporting evidence can be drawn from?

The evidence of achievements sited in the submission needs to be current, i.e. from within the last twelve months at the date of submission (approx September 10 to September 11).

Is there an electronic version of the application pack?

Yes you can download an application pack from the website, or alternatively please email enquiries@contactcentreawards.co.uk and we will forward send a copy to you.

We work in the public sector, and are unable to provide call recordings for legal reasons. Can we still enter our people in to the Contact Centre Superstar category?

We ask for call recordings in this category because we are looking for individuals that can - as part of the criteria - demonstrate the highest levels of customer experience. There can perhaps be no better evidence of 'quality of customer experience' than in a call recording, which gives judges an indication of the entrant's knowledge, empathy, tone, conflict resolution skills and so on. We would therefore urge organisations, wherever possible, to consult with senior managers to ascertain whether it is feasible to provide a call recording that is suitably edited/censored to remove any sensitive information that could identify the caller. We are happy to receive call recordings that are muted at relevant points (ie where sensitive information like names or account numbers are disclosed), yet still allow us to appreciate and assess the advisor's customer service skills.

We do acknowledge that there are instances - in the public sector or with outsourcers dealing with public sector contracts - where it is legally impossible for organisations to provide a call recording or even a suitably redacted transcript of a call. In these instances, we would advise individuals to still enter the Contact Centre Superstar category, but to clearly state - at the front of their submission - the reason why they are unable to provide a recording. In these instances, the judges will assess potential 'superstars' on the value of their paper submission alone. Depending on the volume of entries from/pertaining to the public sector, the judges may also decide to award a separate prize for the best submission from this group.

PLEASE NOTE: The relaxed rules outlined above only pertain to public sector organisations or outsourcers dealing with public sector contracts. We still expect entrants from private sector organisations to provide call recordings, as requested.

Is it possible to submit a call recording without breaking any data protection laws?

Yes, all call recordings must be submitted in line with data protection laws. This may involve starting the call recording once personal details have been collected for example or removing any personal details from the WAV.

Within our contact centre we have a number of sales advisors working in various departments but all performing different roles. How would you advise we go about selecting the strongest nominations for this year's Awards?

We would encourage organisations to enter as many individuals as you want from different departments/teams, where it's clear that the people in question are doing sufficiently different roles from one another. An issue only arises when organisations enter several different people who are doing exactly the same job and are very similar in calibre. If you can't distinguish between them, then it can be impossible for the judges to do so! It therefore makes it difficult for that particular company/organisation to stand out from the crowd. However, if people are in different types of sales roles, we would urge you to work out who are the best in each function/department, and then enter as many of those top players as possible.

Can public sector contact centres place entries or is it restricted to private or voluntary sector contact centres?

The North East Contact Centre Awards is open to contact centres of all sectors including the public sector. We often have entries from councils and government departments and have had both winners and runners-up from the public sector.

If you can't distinguish between them, then it can be impossible for the judges to do so! It therefore makes it difficult for that particular company/organisation to stand out from the crowd. However, if people are in different types of sales roles, we would urge you to work out who are the best in each function/department, and then enter as many of those top players as possible.

What are pull quotes?

Pull quotes are small, bite-sized pieces of information (sometimes a direct quotation from an individual, sometimes a piece of data or a sentence that succinctly captures what the writer is trying to convey) that make text more visually appealing. This is typically done by making the type font bigger than the rest of the text. (You can find an exact definition of the phrase 'pull-quote', together with a visual example, at the following site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pull_quote)

Essentially, the idea of pull-quotes is to draw the readers' attention to a specific point... to emphasise a particular strength, for example, or to quote an individual who has something particularly interesting to say. Because they are so short and a design feature more than anything else, they should NOT be included in the wordcount.

There's a great document online about pull-quotes that gives you pretty much all the info you need on them and how to use them! It can be found at: http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/pagelayout/ht/pull_quotes.htm

Where can we find information to compare (benchmark) our company against the contact centre industry?

We would advise her do a simple google search to start with because some of the main ones become pretty obvious when you do.

Another simple trick (which was mentioned during the workshops) would be to do a trawl within the news sections of Call Centre Focus' and Call Centre Helper's websites, using keywords like 'benchmark', 'survey' and 'study'. The same technique can be applied to the 'press release' or 'news' sections of industry or other relevant professional bodies (for example, the CCA or the CIPD).

Doing this should throw up several recent pieces of research - the operative word being recent; benchmarking should be as current as possible. (It doesn't really cut the mustard if, for example, a financial company were to compare its CSAT results with scores from a financial services CSAT benchmarking survey conducted in 2008.)

The great thing about press releases and news items is that they give you headline results from which you can draw direct benchmarking comparisons with your own organisation. They are also free, where full reports may not be.

This said, we would advocate that people try to do as much research as possible. If full reports are available free of charge, we suggest they are downloaded and read as more solid benchmarking stats might come to light that way.

Within the application we have graphs and figures to show performance and quality of the jobholders/teams etc which highlight the results of the narrative which explain the actions taken by the nominee. If we remove these graphs and figures (for data protection reasons) and only leave the narratives will this affect the strength of our application?

We would advocate that entrants use graphs/figures wherever possible for the same reasons as we promote the use of pull quotes:

They are visual constructs that can help consolidate the key points you are trying to make within a submission in a very immediate way and without the need for cross-referencing.
They help break up the text/ introduce white space in to a submission, which makes it easier for the judges to read.
They do not count towards the overall word count.

We will not penalise entrants for not including graphs/figures. However, we would kindly remind nominees that their submission will be compared on a like-for-like basis against other organisations who may choose to use these tools to demonstrate an individual's/team's/contact centre's capabilities and/or improvement in service/sales. It is therefore advisable to include as much quantitative evidence as possible within any one submission.

If data protection is a concern, one suggestion might be to use a graph or figure to visually demonstrate the difference between one individual/team/centre and their peers without providing business-sensitive information on the X or Y axis that will tell the judges exactly who those peers are or what volumes/values are attached to that individual's/team's/centre's performance/quality. The judges are happy to sign non-disclosure agreements if required.