An interaction center (IC) is a customer service department within a company whose agents use various communication channels to handle inbound contacts, such as customer concerns, as well as outbound
contacts.
IC agents can process business transactions, such as service orders, and can enhance their productivity, for example by using a knowledge search. All relevant account information is available to them in the IC.
Generally, the IC supports the following processes:
● Communication process
This business process involves the communication between an IC agent and a business partner (customer,
employee, and so on) in real time, for example, using the telephony channel.
● Interaction process
The interaction process is the central IC process, which often encompasses the communication process
and the business transaction process, and is performed whenever an agent uses the IC to communicate or
interact – either directly with a business partner or asynchronously by working on a business transaction
belonging to a business partner.
● Business transaction process
Frequently an interaction will result in one or more follow-on business transactions, such as a service
request. In such cases, each business transaction is linked to the interaction record, providing a connection between the business process and the interaction process.