Background

The relationship goes as far back as 2008, when two small teams of 12 provided customer services to the client. By the time we celebrated the 10 year anniversary of the partnership, the number of FTEs had grown to 130.  Fast forward to now and we are looking at well over 500 of our people working with the client, all based in Cape Town, South Africa. We have also been trusted with more and more, in terms of both the number of services and their complexity. Having initially managed arrears collections cases as an extension of the bank’s internal operation, the relationship has grown to the point where we now manage the entire process, from early stage through to default. We have also added complaint handling, application processing, back office work and fraud operations to the list.

The secret to the partnership’s success

Quality and performance

Collections is a particular speciality of ours and we consistently outperform expectations in this area for our client. We handle complex situations, and communications with vulnerable customers, with care and sensitivity. We always find the right balance between business needs and the well-being of customers. And that same experience and compassion is carried across all our services. 

When it comes to customer and conduct measures, we always score above set targets, as well as in headcount vs budget measures, attrition, tenure, and speed to competency.  

Over the course of our partnership, Sigma Connected has stepped up to meet the many industry-wide challenges and support our client. From the huge shifts in customer and business needs and changing industry and regulatory landscape, to the huge disruptions and resource issues caused by Covid-19. Our commitment, agility and competence has delivered every single challenge to date. The client can rely on us to find pragmatic and innovative solutions that will have a positive impact on customer engagement, operational efficiency and cost-to-serve.

Cost efficiency

There’s no denying that offshoring is cost-effective. While there are certainly perfectly good, cheaper offshore destinations, when it comes to voice services and complex transactions, the value that South Africa delivers in terms of customer satisfaction is huge. For this client, we have delivered c.50% cost reduction with no loss of performance, effectiveness or customer engagement by transitioning collections and customer services to our contact centre in Cape Town.

Agility

The fact that we can mobilise quickly, increase team numbers to meet spikes in demand, or even to assemble new teams from scratch, has proved critical to the partnership. 

Our leanness and agility also mean that we’re able to give our full attention to our client, throughout the duration of the relationship. 

Accessibility

We give the same energy and effort to current, long-standing clients as we do to winning new ones. So the hands-on leadership from our executive team doesn’t change as soon as the contract is signed. Our client can speak to any of us, very easily, with named contacts always there when needed. Our business model keeps us that way, just the right size to deliver big, but remain a business with heart and soul. 

People

We recruit carefully, train extensively and focus on careers, rather than jobs. We also practice Impact Sourcing both in the UK and South Africa. Put all of this together and it means we have dedicated, happy employees, with low attrition rates. 

With this client in particular, the length of the relationship means that many team members have been working alongside the client’s own teams for a very long time. The mutual feeling is that with this partnership we are an extension of their business.  We share the same values and culture, and pride in our work.

Looking forward

We have already seen a contract grow into a partnership, where Sigma Connected is regarded as a strategic, trusted partner for a growing range of customer operations. We’re trusted with complex interactions requiring not only exceptional engagement skills and knowledge of product and regulatory parameters, but also an empathetic and sensitive approach. 

Our client works hard to continuously improve customer experience, putting the customer at the core of the business. Thanks to our agility we’re able to be part of that continuous improvement, and flex to meet any future challenges and changes in customer needs. With new additional services and pilots for the client in the pipeline, we’re hopeful we can continue to be actively involved in their customer and business strategy and direction.