Fonolo makes IVR system navigation easier

The frustration sometimes experienced by navigating interactive voice response (IVR) systems could soon become a thing of the past if a new service developed by Toronto-based Fonolo lives up to its promise. The company unveiled and demonstrated the innovative service at eComm 2008 in Mountain View CA earlier this month, and Fonolo CEO Shai Berger expects the service to be in beta testing this summer. Customers log onto the website and search Fonolo's database of companies. Users find the company they wish to call and click on the department they want to contact. Fonolo then dials the company, navigates the IVR system with a combination of speech recognition technology and automated dialing processes, and calls the user back, connected to the department of their choice. "The key to Fonolo is our database of all the phone menus that customers typically call. Basically, it's a transcription of all the phone menus, including the commands you use to get from one spot in the menu to another," Berger tells Network Letter. "Getting that database is quite tricky. It's a combination of a database that we've invented, that uses an automatic dialing mechanism, speech recognition... and of course, human editors. It's a spider system, very much like what Google does with websites. They spider websites to create a searchable index and we spider phone space," he says. The process takes as much time as a traditional call, but frees users from being tied to their phone throughout the process. Berger could not provide any data on how long it typically takes for a user to navigate an IVR, but an informal sample of calls placed to several financial services and telecom companies revealed an average time of 2 minutes and 43 seconds. Database can archive calls The time and frustration saved is only a part of the service. The intelligent call history feature provides a unified, detailed list of calls placed by registered users, regardless of the phone used. The calls are routed through Fonolo's servers, enabling the service to archive call recordings, which can later be used to review details of transactions or emailed to company representatives. Users can also type notes, such as new phone plan details and store them alongside the recording, with no software to install and at no cost. "There will always be a free version of Fonolo. We're going to cover the cost of the operation with advertising on the site and through premium services. We haven't announced those yet, but some will be transcripts of the calls, and other interesting services that we have in the pipeline," says Berger. Berger wouldn't reveal how many companies' IVR systems the company has already spidered, but he expects several hundred companies will be indexed in time for the summer beta testing launch. The database, he says, will be continuously updated and expanded based on consumers' searches and requests. "Our database will grow in a somewhat collaborative effort with our users," he explains. Berger says overall reaction has been positive, but acknowledges there may be some reticence from users to adopt the new service. Encouraging consumers to use a computer to help place a customer service call that will ultimately return to their handset won't be easy. Not only will users need access to the internet at the time of the call, but with little timesaving benefits, features will need to be particularly appealing and users will genuinely need to be ready to hang-up on IVRs. The Fonolo CEO insists his company is not trying to rid the world of IVR systems or help consumers get to the quickest live agent as is proclaimed by websites such as www.gethuman.com. Rather, Berger says, the company's deep dialing doesn't circumvent IVR menus - it tries to work with the system. "Were not trying to bypass the IVR system. I think there's a lot of value in those menus. is more of a collaborative attempt to make it less frustrating to access," he explains.

Fonolo makes IVR system navigation easier

News | 03/24/2008 4:12 pm EDT

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