Whats is legacy IVRS and what is VoiceXML based IVR System ?

Legacy IVRS
Legacy IVRS can be defined as the IVR Software installed on a personal computer and is developed using available native CTI Card APIs. The IVR software is developed for one CTI brand and model and the IVR Software may not work for any other CTI board or even model. Also, this type of IVR Software depends on the telephony interface used between CTI board and telephone exchange.
Legacy IVR software is supposed to control both the telephone interface part as well as VUI ( Voice User Interface). IVR software developer is supposed to be well versed with API provided by one particular CTI board as well as knowledgeable in switch technologies. Legacy IVR software performs every functionality in a interactive voice response system.

VoiceXML based IVRS
VoiceXML based IVR software can be defined as those IVR software which are written in VoiceXML. They normally deal with VUI(Voice User Interface) part of a interactive voice response system. VoiceXMX based IVR Software are neither dependent on CTI board/CTI Model nor interface with telephone switch. Any hardware interaction is performed by VoiceXML interpreter.
VoiceXML based IVR applications mainly deal with call flow of the IVRS. So, to write a VoiceXML based IVR software one may not require to know about CTI boards or any telecom switch!

Comparison
Both legacy IVRS and VoiceXML based IVRS have their own advantages and disadvantages. Though recently, many IVR companies are moving towards voiceXML based IVRS, there are still many die-hard legacy IVRS fans including me. Here I am trying to compare between legacy IVRS and voiceXML mased IVRS:

1. It is not easy to change call flow in a legacy IVR Software due to its strict dependence on CTI hardware used. But since VoiceXML based IVRS is independent of CTI boards, the call change is easy.

2. Programming in legacy IVRS is dependent on the CTI board, vendor and even model as well as the interface with telecom switch, but in case of VoiceXML, it is not dependent on those hardware.

3. VoiceXML based IVRS is much easier to develop as it is more like HTML for web portals and rightly they are said to be voice portals. Legacy IVRS is more difficult to develop as one has to learn about CTI board, its APIs and also its interfacing with telecom switch.

4. VoiceXML based IVRS is independent of operating systems used while legacy IVRS is dependent on operating system used.

5. VoiceXML is standard with fixed syntax. While legacy IVRS is not standardised in a sense that they are developed in wide variety of computer languages and platforms. Some use C++, some VB, some C language. Coding style may differ from one developer to another making it difficult for third-party to improve on a existing legacy IVRS.

Though, while developing VoiceXML based IVRS, one may not be dependent on CTI board or Telephony Interface used, but this is an disadvantage for a developer. They will be hostage to the VoiceXML interpreter. With many CTI manufacturer with various specification, it may not be easy for one VoiceXML interpreter to work on all CTI boards! So, it may not be correct to say that VoiceXML is totally independent of CTI boards.

In a legacy IVRS, developer has complete control of the software. So it is much easier in legacy IVRS to ingerate the IVR software with any other application which may not be possible in case of VoiceXML based IVRS. For example, in a call center, if there is already an existing CRM software and IVRS needs to be integrated with it, then most probably, VoiceXML based IVRS may not be able to integrate, but legacy IVRS can easily be integrated.

Both legacy and voiceXML has advantages and disadvantages. It will be wise to choose one among them as per requirements and usage. In some cases, voiceXML based IVRS may be better ( for example Voice Portal) while in scientific or specific application like medical applications, legacy IVRS is better suited.

My personal opinions.

As I wrote once about making money with IVR Software, I have finally decided to write what IVR applications can be used to generate monthly revenue. Till recently, IVR Application or IVR Software was thought to be used only for increase in efficiency, reduce cost, automatic complaint management etc. Not any more! There are now IVR applications which are mostly used to generating revenue!

There are many IVR Applications in many industries, but the use of IVR Software in Telecom Industries is quite interesting! And this is where you make regular money. The most widely deployed IVRS Software for making money are :

1. Voice Portal
2. CRBT or PRBT

1. Voice Portal
Voice portals started as a premium service for quick access of information. According to various sources, it first appeared in 1999 in line with internet web portal.
With the advent of mobile phone, there was surge in value added service. This is when Voice Portals also got a push by telecom service providers.
Normally, voice portals are operated by a value added service provider (VAS) companies like Niche Tech Services (P) Ltd, or OnMobile in collaboration with a telecom service provider on revenue sharing basis. Normally, any call made to voice portal is charged premium. Voice portals provides various information, news, entertainment etc. The revenue model goes like this :
1. Per call is charged premium at Rs. 6 per minute of usage
2. Revenue is shared between telecom services provider and the VAS service provider. Revenue sharing is heavily tilted towards telecom service provider in India while it is opposite in some countries like China.
3. Billing is done monthly by the VAS Operator to telecom service provider.Telecom service provider charges mobile user in their telephone bills.

One telecom service provider can have many voice portals catering to many niche markets. The voice portal market is still growing and there are scopes for new players!

2. CRBT or PRBT
CRBT ( Caller Ringback Tone) is also known as PRBT( Personalised ring back tone.). This is nothing but an IVR Application as I explained earlier too. It also started quite recently in 2000 only! The increase in usage and popularity of CRBT is largely due to increase in Mobile Telephony and marketing by Mobile telephony provider.
CRBT has been very popular all over the world. Specially in South Korea, China and India. The revenue model is little different than voice portal. CRBT is again provide normally by a VAS operator to a telecom service provider. Here is the revenue model:

1. A subscriber is charged a monthly rental for using the CRBT service. Normally it is small amount like Rs. 30/- a month.
2. Subscriber can change CRBT tone by calling up a Voice Portal Number, add specific ring tone or song for a specific caller according to caller id. Each change is charged Rs. 15.
3. It does not charge for playing the ring tone for every call.
4. Revenue is shared between VAS operator and telecom service provider.
5. Since it uses songs, there may be a revenue sharing with music producers too.

Normally, one telecom service provider can not have more than one VAS operator for CRBT due to its technical setup. The market is still growing and big. There are still scope for new players, specially in India.

Apart from these two IVR Applications, I believe both Voice SMS, Outbound IVRS and UMS(Unified Messaging Service) are other IVR application which can be used commercially to make money. I will write more about them in future.

Special Disclaimer : The prices given above are just a number to give an idea of charging subscribers. It should not be taken as absolute fact.

IVR Software has many applications in medical field. While IVRS has been used quite effectively and efficiently in Medical Research field already, IVRS can be used in a Hospital too. IVR Software works 24 hours a day and that is one of the major advantage of IVRS.
Hospitals involve many routine and mundane procedures which can be replaced by an intelligent IVR Software quite effectively. In fact, using IVR Software might increase the utilization of resources as well and increase efficiency and better output for the hospital. Here is a list of Tasks that can be done with a IVR Software for Hospitals:-

1. Initial Patient Admission Screening and Scheduling
Initial procedures or routine inquiries can be handled effectively by IVR Software, like referring to right department and consulting doctor. It can also provide scheduled consultancy time with doctor on a phone so that the patient may avoid waiting in the hospital.

2. Test reports
Test reports can be made available to consultant doctors immediately by a outbound call as soon as test is complete. It will increase efficiency and lead to consultant doctor take decision quicker.

3. Resources Allocation
Using IVR Software, resources can be allocated efficiently. For example, X-RAY room. Any one requiring X-RAY cn lodge a request through IVR Software and outbound call will alert when it is available.

4. Poll and Advertising
Hospitals can provide information about its facilities, services through its IVR Software to callers from any telephone number. It can also do outbound calls and conduct polls, gather feedback from previous patients.

5. Patient Records
Patient records can be maintained through IVR Software. Dispensing medicines, accessing various test reports as per patient id can be performed by IVR Software.

In fact, many hospital procedures can be automated using IVR Software. IVR Software can be integrated with any existing Hospital Management software and can be used as voice portal for the Hospital.

High-End digital CTI boards for a voice portal is not cheap! In fact some of them cost as much as a Honda Civic car in India. So, choosing a right CTI Board for your Voice Portal may not be easy, that is until you read this article .

So, how to choose a CTI Board for your voice portal application ? There are few parameters using which one should choose CTI Board for Voice Portal:-

1. Number of Expected Simultaneous Calls
Most important factor to consider! If you expect simultaneous calls to be not more than four, buy any four channel analog card. But than, most probably it will not remain a voice portal! Ideally, if one should choose a CTI board with 50% more capacity than the expected number of glutenous calls. if some one expects 10-15 calls, he should choose one 30 port Digital CTI board.

2. Time to connect a call
Time taken for connecting a call when an user call is important! It depends of the interface the CTI board supports. For example, CAS R2MF connects much slower than SS7 or ISDN PRI. One will hear “teent teent teent” sound after dialing the Voice Portal before connection. Normally quick and instant connection to Voice Portal is desired.

3. Interface With Switch Support
The type of interfacing with switch of Telecom Provider is important parameter to consider. Many Telecom Service Provider may not have CAS or ISDN protocols on their switch or they may not be willing to provide that connectivity to Voice Portal operators. So, one must consider about available protocol with Telecom Provider before deciding on a CTI board. Interfacing with various protocols is responsible time to connect of calls. SS7 cards are costlier than ISDN PRI or CAS R2MF boards, connects calls almost instantly. And some CTI Manufacturer like Dialogic does not have a combined board which has both Voice Processing and SS7 Signaling so far! This kind of arrangement has its own advantage over combined CTI boards. For example, one can have add more Media Processing (Voice Processing) Boards while keeping one signaling board in one system. Also combined (Signaling and Media Processing) CTI boards do not come in low density configuration, they normally have 8 E1 or more. 4E1 meaning at least 120 simultaneous calls!

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3. Scalability and IVR Software
This is another aspect one should not ignore. If the Voice Portal becomes popular, which is the main aim by any Voice Portal Operator, so the CTI Boards should have scalability feature where increasing number of simultaneous calls should not make existing hardware redundant, or make IVR Software obsolete. Separate boards for signaling and media processing is recommended for scalability. IVR Software should be designed such a way that, it can handle more voice resources without having to re-develop the IVR Software.

4. Support for the CTI Board
Availability of development support as well as quick 24 hours support for any problem in the CTI hardware is a must! Every minutes of downtime of Voice Portal, the operator loses revenue! So, one should choose a CTI vendor which can provide quick support or quick replacement of CTI hardware in case of CTI board failure! Also, CTI Vendor should have active forum to discuss various issues and should have good number of third party developers!

5. Cost
Cost is very important, well for everybody! But, one should not compromise of quality of CTI cards for cost.

My Favourite and Recommended CTI hardware:

1. For 30 to 120 simultaneous Calls.
Start with Dialogic D/300 JCT or DMV1200 card. They have ISDN, R2MF protocol, good support, quite tested CTI board. Many developers have written IVR Software on them! Dialogic has good support, active forum, large number of developers. But since they are the biggest CTI vendor, they may not provide you with a demo card for development of your Voice Portal!
These boards can be even used with Dialogic SS7 Signaling boards.

2. For 240 or more simultaneous calls
1. Synway SHD-240D-CT/PCI
Good Value for money, good support. Built in Signaling and media processing. Cheaper than Dialogic equivalent.
2. Dialogic SPCI4/SPCI2 and DNI2410
Awesome combination, great scalability, very good support and large number of developers as well as very active forum. Cost is almost double that Synway though!

So, you thought IVRS is some Computer Telephony Integration Hardware and a piece of Software, installed and running 24 hours a day on a Personal Computer to play recorded voice as soon as a caller calls the IVRS Number?
You have completely under-estimated IVRS. But then don’t loose your heart, you belong to the majority! And it’s perfectly fine to underestimate.

But then imagine the following scenarios:-

1. You call your telephone company customer service number. You are welcome to Customer Care service. Then some music. Then it starts giving out long list of options to choose. Some options are for pressing a key and some require you to speak one word or some words. But then its not what you were looking, so you want to speak to an customer care executive. Normally its by pressing 9. So, dutifully you press 9. Another melody. Then you get to hear, “Your Call is Important to us”, please wait while we are transferring your call. Another melody! Already 2 minutes gone, Your call is important to us, again, cool, they are making your call important by making you talking to a machine! 4 minutes gone by then, and finally you get to hear, All our customer care executives are busy. Your call is important to us. Please wait while we are trying to connect you to our customer care executive. The approximate time for connection is 4 minutes. Kindly hold the line or please call later. You take the advice. You hang up and call after 10 minutes. The same procedure follows! What you do? Utter some profanities/expletives and slam the phone down?
2. You call large enterprise customer support number. Welcome prompts! Then a list of teeth breaking technical sounding department list. You somehow manage to remember the option for your department and press the right key or speak the right word and IVRS could understand! Then the next prompt comes! This particular division is closed now! Thank you for calling. And then you hear a busy tone! Did they shut the door in front of your face ? What you can do? Slam the phone. Stamp your feet on your floor?

There are many more similar situations! You scratch your head and wonder what made them call themselves Customer Care Service? Where you did not even get the care, let alone the service you were looking?

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The answer is lack of knowledge of usability of IVRS by the design engineer or the company!

Make no mistake, like any other software, IVRS is also normally designed and developed by some software engineers without much input from either marketing or customer service people. And they will concentrate more on software features like call flow, database integration, TTS Integration, smart speech recognitions and many more.

What are the consequences of IVRS with poor usability? They are:-
1. Frustrated and Angry customers ( you will hear lot of expletives and profanities you record your IVRS calls and dare to listen them)
2. High call duration but no satisfactory service to the customer. Poor usage of IVRS
3. High hang ups.
4. Increased cost as it will transfer more calls to customer care executives.
5. Decline in customer satisfaction affecting brand value of the company.

But then you need not worry, I have a collection of tips to increase usability of IVRS. To be posted shortly.