Wolseley is the UK operating company of Wolseley plc, the world’s largest distributor of heating and plumbing products to professional contractors and a leading supplier of building materials in North America and Europe. Across the country, Wolseley UK’s trade branches service customers’ on-demand and time-critical needs, either over the counter or via telephone.
Wolseley UK embarked on an exercise to identify a call reporting system that could accurately analyse missed calls in real-time and enable busy branch managers to resolve queries across the 919 branches.
iC360 Suite enables customer calls to be managed in real-time at branch level, and in-depth analytics / reportsto be generated by its executives.
Wolseley UK’s priority is to achieve excellence in customer service. Wolseley UK believes iC360 Suite is helping to accomplish this.
Wolseley UK is the UK operating company of Wolseley plc, the world's largest distributor of heating andplumbing products to professional contractors and a leading supplier of building materials in NorthAmerica and Europe. Founded in 1887, Wolseley plc has around 43,000 employees and is listed on theLondon Stock Exchange (LSE: WOS) as well as being quoted in the FTSE 100. Wolseley UK has 919branches, 5,913 employees and is achieving trading profits of £92m.
Across the country, Wolseley UK’s trade branches service customers’ on‐demand and time‐critical needs, either over the counter or via telephone.
To heighten operational efficiency and achieve their objective of exceptional customer service, Wolseley UK undertook a series of customer surveys to see where they could improve.
National business statistics show that 56.7% of all missed calls never leave a message and never call back.
In line with their strategic IT and communications infrastructure upgrade, Wolseley UK identified the need for new technologies. Wolseley UK embarked on an exercise to identify a call reporting system that could accurately analyse missed calls in real‐time and enable busy branch managers to resolve queries across their 919 branches.
Wolseley UK piloted 4 systems that could not deliver what they needed, before finding Tollring; selected for their technical competence and personal approach.
23 branches committed to the pilot of Tollring’s flexible and innovative solution iC360 suite. This system would deliver branch level call reporting to Wolseley UK’s sites across the country, accessible via web browsers.
Although the original aim of the project was to provide an on‐premise solution, Tollring decided that iC360 should be delivered as a managed service. This would centralise Wolseley UK’s company‐wide information so it could be viewed at both local and company level. Tollring adapted its proposition and worked quickly to deliver a pilot of iC360.
iC360 works by gathering data from multiple Cisco telephony sources (CUCM Cisco Unified Call Manager and Call Manager Express). Incoming / outgoing calls are itemised and missed calls are monitored.
The implementation went according to plan, with branch management describing it as ‘the best new system they have had in years’.
The first version of the product was delivered within 6weeks. This included some heavy customisation and crucially, the implementation required no capital outlay.
iC360 enables customer calls to be managed by Wolseley UK in real‐time at branch level, and reports to be generated by its executives. At branch level iC360 delivers efficient day‐to‐day management of missed calls:
At executive level, iC360 delivers in‐depth analytics to manage the business, these include:
“iC suite is a simple concept that can transform customer experience.”
Wolseley UK Head of Business Infrastructure.
The results and the return
Wolseley UK immediately identified that iC360 would improve customer satisfaction and retention, resulting in significant financial returns. Wolseley’s managers and users are delighted with iC360 and customer feedback is outstanding. One customer said “I already get a good service but now it is even better knowing that if I try to ring and there is no answer in a couple of rings I can hang up knowing they will ring me back. It’s one of the main reasons that I shop there. ”
“My customers like the personal service that we offer and my sales have definitely increased”
Pudsey Plumb Center Branch Manager
iC360 differentiates Wolseley UK from its competitors. According to the Econsultancy MultiChannel Customer Experience Report, only 26%of companies have a well‐developed strategy in place for improving customer experience, which demonstrates the importance of competitive advantage on customer service. Wolseley UK’s priority is to achieve excellence in customer service. Wolseley UK believes iC360 is helping to accomplish this.
iC360 has been deployed at 717 branches and is being rolled out to 50 branches per month. Thesolution will be extended to all 919 branches. Pilots are underway in the US and Nordics and the next step is to introduce ‘click to dial’ to make it even easier for branches to return missed calls.
