The expanding compliance technology market

Compliance across channels

CallMiner has been analyzing telephone conversations for nearly 2 decades and sells a platform for interaction analytics management called Eureka. Now that most companies are omni-channel, it is important to also handle chat, text, email, and social media messages. The ability to scale up is also critical. “One of our first clients was a major airline,” says Jeff Gallino, CTO of CallMiner, “and they had 5,000 agents on duty. Each one handled dozens of calls a day. In order to function, our software had to scale in a serious way. We currently have 350 corporate customers, and at the end of each day we have typically processed 7.5 million contacts.”

Although Eureka has a variety of use cases, Gallino estimates that for about one-third of the customers, compliance is the first one they implement. “Among our customers are a number of collection agencies,” continued Gallino. “These companies have very stringent requirements associated with their interactions with consumers.” For example, they must state they are calling in order to collect a debt, but this statement may be made only to the debtor, not to anyone else who answers the phone or hears a voicemail message. Voice analytics can confirm whether the required disclosures are being made.

The underlying information that supports compliance consists of a complex rule base and documentation. “It takes a team to maintain the rules and knowledgebase,” said Gallino. “Corporate policies and compliance regulations are both likely to change over time, as is the relevant customer base.” These changes require corresponding changes in the rule base.

Speech analytics

Some companies begin by using speech analytics retrospectively, so they can review results of Eureka’s analysis of compliance in order to correct agent performance as needed. Others use Eureka’s real-time analytics capability to inform agents of errors while the conversation is in progress and to provide pop-up alerts with corrective actions to be taken at the time. “This approach leverages the conversation very effectively, but requires a higher level of maturity on the part of the company,” Gallino commented. “Real-time speech analytics is sophisticated and requires a sophisticated implementation.”

Using post-call analytics first is a good approach because it allows companies to understand what their customers are saying and how their agents are answering and interacting. As the company learns more, it gains the insights it needs in order to use the real-time capabilities. Mapping the conversation and appropriate responses into various subject areas is challenging, and the frequency of presenting compliance-related notices needs to be carefully paced. “If too many notices start popping up, then the agent will start tuning them out,” noted Gallino.

Additional benefits

Once real-time speech analytics technology is in place, it can be used to provide other types of relevant information to the agent during the conversation, such as technical or product information. So, even though the initial pain point was compliance, benefits may ripple through other parts of the enterprise, impacting customer service and producing cost savings, as well as generating sales.

“Efficiency can be dramatically improved by reducing the time it takes for agents to answer questions on any subject,” Gallino pointed out. “For every 1,000 agents, 1 second of talk time saved equals $10,000 per month. Also, if the caller’s conversation is analyzed and, as a result, the agent can direct the call to the right person, a great deal of time can be saved because the caller does not have to explain their purpose to an additional agent.”

Forrester states that using AI to improve transcription is well-established, and that the leading speech analytics solutions are using AI and machine learning for gaining insights into data. Advances in AI technology will continue to improve these capabilities in detecting and responding to compliance-related issues. The leading speech analytics solutions use AI more effectively to provide insights, and they also integrate with other enterprise applications.

Orchestrating compliance

According to Deloitte, nearly 80% of organizations are concerned about their ability to adapt to changing regulations, and 75% are concerned about lack of integration among their systems. Developing the infrastructure for dealing with these issues can go a long way toward reducing the regulatory burden.

With the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) having just gone into effect, companies doing business in the state are now facing the prospect of fines that can reach $7,500 per violation. The law does not apply to all organizations; it has criteria that relate to the organizations’ revenue and the volume of consumer data they buy or sell. Nevertheless, CCPA reflects a broader trend toward greater protection. Other states are also moving ahead with privacy legislation. For example, Nevada passed an amendment to its existing privacy law that took effect in October, giving consumers the right to opt out of having their information shared. Other states passing privacy regulations include Maine, Massachusetts, New York, and Texas.