Eckoh Technologies Regulatory News (ECK)

14 May 2007 07:01

Eckoh PLC14 May 2007 14 May 2007 Eckoh plc (Eckoh or "the Company") Parcelforce Worldwide extends its parcel redelivery service using advanced self-service technologies from Eckoh Leading express logistics company, Parcelforce Worldwide, has significantlyextended the scope of its contract with BT and Eckoh, one of Europe's leadingproviders of outsourced automated solutions, with a series of innovativeenhancements to its parcel redelivery service. The new and enhanced service builds upon the automated speech recognitionsolution for redeliveries developed by Eckoh and BT and implemented byParcelforce Worldwide earlier this year. The extended redeliveries service will see Eckoh take responsibility forParcelforce Worldwide's entire end-to-end redeliveries support service, whichincludes management of the front end web interface, as well as co-ordinatingcustomer instructions with Parcelforce Worldwide's delivery depots and customercontact centres. With further developments planned for later this year,customers will soon have the convenience of making payments for additionalservice options, such as requesting a redelivery on a Saturday or to a differentaddress, using a fully automated telephone based payment system. The fully hosted service will provide a high level of consistency across allcontact channels, whether web or telephone based. The overall solution utilisesEckoh's extensive speech recognition expertise and self-service technologyplatform, but also leverages Eckoh's substantial web design and deploymentheritage, which now forms an integral part of the enhanced solution. Emma Bailey, Customer Services Policy Manager at Parcelforce Worldwide says: "Bytaking over the full end-to-end redeliveries support process, Eckoh and BT willhelp us to further streamline our efficiency and service performance throughensuring that customer requirements are consistently and accurately met by ourdelivery network and across all of our contact channels." Jim Hennigan, Executive Director at Eckoh comments: "We are delighted to furtherextend our support to Parcelforce Worldwide's initiatives aimed at enhancingtheir customers' service experience. We are confident that these customerservice ambitions will be helped significantly by the introduction of anautomated payments option and the consolidation of the redeliveries service,which will benefit from Eckoh's broader managed services portfolio and mostnotably our web expertise." Eckoh expects to manage in excess of 1 million calls on behalf of ParcelforceWorldwide during 2007. Enquiries: Eckoh plcNik Philpot 08701 100 700Adam MoloneyJim Hennigan Corfin CommunicationsHarry Chathli, Neil Thapar + 44 20 7929 8989 Blue Oar Securities PlcDavid Seal/Jerry Keen + 44 20 7448 4400 Notes to editor About Eckoh Eckoh sets the standard for outsourced automated solutions across Europe,specialising in advanced speech recognition and interactive services. Eckohenables its clients to communicate more effectively and to enhance theirprofitability, while making life better for the people who use their services. Eckoh provides automated services for clients in virtually every industry sectorincluding Vue Cinemas, William Hill, 02, Ideal Shopping Direct, DEFRA, TheLondon Stock Exchange, National Rail Enquiries, AXA PPP healthcare, BSkyB,Parcelforce Worldwide, BAA, Barclays Stockbrokers, TD Waterhouse, Scottish Powerand NIE (Northern Ireland Electricity). Eckoh is also a market leader in providing interactive services to large mediaowners and has amongst its clients ITV, the UK's largest commercial broadcaster,Trinity Mirror, the largest newspaper publisher and IPC, the leading consumermagazines group. In 2003, Eckoh formed a strategic alliance with BT to capitalise on the growingopportunity for speech recognition services in the corporate marketplace. Thealliance, which was extended in July 2005 until 2010, has supplied speechservices to over 25 clients generating more than 55 million minutes of speechself-service transactions. The combined strengths of both parties have createdan unrivalled and value-added speech proposition and clients of the allianceinclude: National Rail Enquiries, Parcelforce Worldwide, Barclays Stockbrokers,TD Waterhouse, NIE, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and Three Valleys Water. Eckoh has a call processing platform of 10,000 lines (capable of handling over650,000 calls an hour) of which over 8,000 lines incorporate speech recognitiontechnology making it one of the largest speech enabled call processing platformsin Europe. In the year to 31 March 2006 Eckoh generated a turnover of £127 million and hada cash balance of £12.7m. Results for the year ending March 2007 will bereleased in June 2007. Further information can be found at www.eckoh.com. -ends- This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange