Friday 9 November 2012

CORACALL PLANS AGGRESSIVE GROWTH IN DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA

On the occasion of its launch of South African operations Coracall announced plans for rapid growth for its local facility.
 
At an inauguration function at Vogue Restaurant, Durban, Mr Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer remarked, “Tonight marks the culmination of many months of hard work by our dedicated Coracall teams across the globe. It’s with great pride that we launch our newest Contact Centre here in Durban this evening. The excitement we feel is reflected in our customers’ interest, both existing and prospective, in exactly what South Africa has to offer them. We see rapid growth for our centre and this is in line with our desire to be contributor to the local economy.”
 
Mr Ian Kinsey, Managing Director of Coracall South Africa added, “I’ve been fortunate to have witnessed the overall growth of South Africa in my seven years of being based here. South Africa now competes on a level playing field with more mature off shoring destinations, and therefore, we’re confident that Coracall is will add to the already promising growth story.”

Emerging Call Centre and BPO trends

Call center & BPO offerings and service complexity has increased according to leading UK based contact center solutions company - Coracall. Highlighting some of the emerging trends in the call center industry, Patrick David, Head of International Sales and Marketing observed that, “Over the last few years call centers have become the primary channel for customer service. As customer demands for higher levels of service have increased, so has the sophistication of the agent handling such queries. Coupled with new and improved technology, customer delight has emerged as the key driver for call center success.”

When asked about other trends, Mr David replied, “One only has to look at the evolution of the call center industry. In the early days outsourcing was more linear and typically revolved around answering inbound calls. With the emergence of the internet email support became an additional channel of service and a natural extension of this was back office support. With the proliferation of social media, agents now have the skill sets to work across different contact channels or combinations of voice and non-voice. At Coracall our agents are multi skilled and we like to think of them as “Knowledge Professionals”, with the ability to service our customers across a range of contact channels.”

Coracall's Contact Centre South Africa gears up for Financial Services Board (FSB) License

Commenting on the process, Mr Ian Kinsey Managing Director Coracall South Africa said, “The requirements of the Financial Advisors and Intermediary Services (FAIS) Act, requires by law that we obtain a license to practice from the Financial Services Board (FSB).
 
The FSB ensures that holders of the certification possess sufficient knowledge and are "fit-and-proper" to dispense advice. For our Financial Services sector clients, this provides an additional layer of security and piece of mind beyond the robust governance and regulatory norms that we currently adhere to. FSB accreditation reflects the philosophy of the Company with respect to a commitment to industry standards.”

Coracall Announces Inauguration of Durban, South Africa Facilty

The inauguration to be held at Vogue Restaurant, followed by a tour of the Coracall facility, is expected to be attended by a number of high ranking local government officials and other dignitaries from South Africa and abroad.

Commenting on Coracall’s entry in the South African market, Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer said, “Last year as we planned further expansion of our footprint globally I was pleasantly surprised to learn of the emergence of South Africa as an outsourcing and off shoring destination. I believe this has happened for a number of reasons – strong government support and backing through the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative in the form of subsidies and grants, a favourable time zone – particularly for European customers, cost competitiveness, infrastructure, and of course, access to 350,000 talented graduates each year. When you consider all of these advantages, it made tremendous sense for us to build and establish a presence here.”

Assured Capital Holdings Announces Formation Of Coracall

Commenting on this latest venture, Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Assured Capital Holdings said, “As a business we are constantly exploring ways and means to see how we can offer end to end solutions to our customers. The evolution of Coracall is a logical extension to the lead generation and market research services that we have been providing with great success under the brand name ‘Phruit’ since 2005. With global delivery planned from not only our home base in the UK, Coracall will have a point of presence in South Africa, India and the Philippines which are all key outsourcing and off shoring destinations.”

When asked about synergies between the call centre business and other Group interests, Mr Lightfoot commented, “Coracall will add another dimension to what we currently offer our customers. By adding delivery from global locations, and the emphasis on contact centre services, our customers can now leverage our cost, expertise, technology and talent advantages to create real and tangible value.”

Coracall announces appointment of Ian Allison

Mr. Allison is a Board Member and will be responsible for new business development and structured tendering activity within the UK. Prior to joining Coracall Ian was Managing Director of an Insurance Broker and responsible for its Sales/Marketing Operations. He has over 20 years of experience in the Financial Services and Insurance industries in the UK. He has been associated with the Assured Capital Holdings group of companies, the parent company of a Coracall for more than 4 years.
Commenting on his new role, Mr Allison said, “Moving to our newest group company represents another chapter in our evolution as full service organization. I am looking forward to working with our new team at Coracall and being a part of our global growth plans”

Announcing the appointment, Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer said, “I have had the pleasure of working with Ian for a number of years now and I believe his deep domain expertise in the area of Financial Services, Insurance, Banking and contact centre services will provide us with a solid base on which to build customized solutions and products for our customers across the globe. Ian has a wealth of experience which is going to be critical for our growth.”

Coracall plans aggressive growth in Durban, South Africa

On the occasion of its launch of South African operations Coracall announced plans for rapid growth for its local facility.
 
At an inauguration function at Vogue Restaurant, Durban, Mr Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer remarked, “Tonight marks the culmination of many months of hard work by our dedicated Coracall teams across the globe. It’s with great pride that we launch our newest Contact Centre here in Durban this evening. The excitement we feel is reflected in our customers’ interest, both existing and prospective, in exactly what South Africa has to offer them. We see rapid growth for our centre and this is in line with our desire to be contributor to the local economy.”

Mr Ian Kinsey, Managing Director of Coracall South Africa added, “I’ve been fortunate to have witnessed the overall growth of South Africa in my seven years of being based here. South Africa now competes on a level playing field with more mature off shoring destinations, and therefore, we’re confident that Coracall is will add to the already promising growth story.”

Coracall Announces Multi-lingual Support From It’s BPO Contact Centres

Coracall, a BPO, business process outsourcing contact centre / call centre company specialising in voice, non-voice, and back office support to global organisations today announced the creation of multi lingual voice support solutions.
 
Announcing the new initiative, Mr Phil Lightfoot, Chief Executive Officer remarked, “A number of existing and potential customers have been asking us for multi lingual support for some time and we expect that interest to grow. We believe that this is reflective of the outsourcing market, and customers seeking consolidation of vendors and partners. At the present time we offer Mandarin, Cantonese, Bahasa, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese, Hindi, Malayalam, Tamil, and Tagalog from our facility in the Philippines. Our South Africa center offers support in Afrikaans, and other European languages such as Italian, French and German whilst customers who require large scale support in European languages can also be serviced from a partner site in Hungary.”

Mr Lightfoot further added, “The creation of this offering is a clear value differentiator for Coracall and reflects our desire to address customer requirements in an innovative manner. By housing multiple languages through one location lowers costs, but perhaps more importantly, provides our customers with a single point of reference, thereby improving control and governance.”

Coracall announces ISO 27001 certification by QMS International

On the occasion of successful certification of ISO 27001 today by QMS International, Coracall CEO Mr Phil Lightfoot, CEO of Coracall said, “This certification provides our customers with the comfort of knowing that their data and information security conform to the highest industry standards. As a full service, call centre / BPO company with operations in the UK, South Africa, India and the Philippines the need to ensure data confidentiality is paramount not only to us but to our valued customers.”

When asked about the importance and relevance of ISO 27001, Mr Lightfoot replied, “The importance of the certification and its industry relevance cannot be underestimated. The standard assesses security risks, vulnerabilities, potential information security risks and responses. The fact that we have successfully completed the exhaustive certification process means that our hard work and establishment of internal controls has been rigorous. We believe that this certification is reflective of our core organizational values of credibility, reliability and trust which are at the heart of each and every one of our relationships with our customers. The ISO certification has been a team effort and an enterprise wide initiative and is a credit to our employees across the globe.”

Coracall announces commitment to be an employer of choice

To an audience of local dignitaries and guests, Chief Executive Officer, Phil Lightfoot announced, “At Coracall we are a diverse company that work endlessly to create a supportive and inclusive environment for all our employees. Coracall reaches out to a diverse talent pool of different nationalities, cultures, social background, and work experiences.
 
We believe that difference is our core strength and it’s something we embrace. We’ve worked hard in our other global locations such as the UK, India and the Philippines to create the Coracall Employee Experience. Coracall aims to attract, develop and retain only the very best professionals in the markets in which we operate, working with them to grow their skills in a flexible and innovative environment where respect, openness, creativity, simplicity and independence are the cornerstones of the Coracall culture.”

Coracall announces ISO 9001 certification

Coracall, a UK based, full service call center / BPO company with operations in the UK, South Africa, Philippines and India, announced that it successfully completed ISO 9001 certification today by QMS International.

Mr Phil Lightfoot, CEO of Coracall said, “We are extremely proud to have successfully been certified by QMS as being ISO 9001 compliant. ISO 9001 reaffirms our commitment to ongoing process rigour, compliance and continuous improvement. We are now in the 5%, small and elite group of British companies who have achieved this certification.”

He further added, “One only has to look at some of the basic tenets of the standard to see the alignment with our core organizational values and internal processes. ISO 9001 essentially examines the process maturity of key areas such as operational efficiencies, marketing initiatives, employee engagement, waste reduction, and productivity based on global practices. Whilst all of these areas are a day to day focus of Coracall, we are proud to have the recognition that a certification such as ISO 9001 brings. This is a reflection of our desire to provide our customers with the best possible service and experience.”