The healthcare industry has begun emphasizing customer service in the wake of its historically poor satisfaction scores. With the advent of patient portals, self-service and more accessible health information, consumers expect quick and clear communication with healthcare organizations. Many practices are upgrading their landline systems to a VoIP solution or investing in VoIP call centers to satisfy this demand.
Get the Right Information Faster
Patients don’t like fishing for their insurance card to read off their ID number any more than agents like searching for it in their database. VoIP call centers that integrate with external programs streamline this step by automatically displaying caller information. How? CRM integrations can pull up prior data from patient histories, including alternate contact data, as soon as agents answer the phone. What’s more, those integrated records can supply accurate and rapid outbound contact from the unified databases – that means fewer errors, more contact and better patient/provider communication.
Connect Callers with the Appropriate Agent Right Away
If people don’t like reading their insurance card off to you, they definitely don’t want to do it over and over with different agents. Customers notoriously hate repeating themselves; reduce the risk of frustrating customers (or worse, raising call abandonment rates) by ensuring they reach the right department the first time around. VoIP-enabled call centers use auto-attendants and IVRs that automatically answer calls and intelligently route them through a VoIP PBX to the appropriate agent or department.
Improve Agent and Employee Accessibility
While call transfers can frustrate customers, eliminating transfers is an unrealistic goal; instead, aim to reduce and improve them. SIP VoIP technology can seamlessly route calls for smooth, immediate transfers between departments, branches or locations. VoIP’s mobility also allows agents or practitioners to access their work phone and data from multiple devices: an agent working from home, an employee switching departments or an on-call nurse can make and receive calls with their work number on their cell phone, home phone or laptop.
Paired with VoIP-CRM integration, this fluid call handling and data integration gives agents the instant data and connection customers expect and enjoy.
Digitize Communication and Record-Keeping
Laptop-calling isn’t the only modernization VoIP offers medical practices. VoIP-powered electronic faxing enables medical employees to send and receive faxes over email while preserving the security of analog fax.
In the last decade, digital record-keeping in the medical sector grew by about 75 percent. Consumers now expect digital access to health records, invoices and other transaction histories. Transferring fax systems to VoIP means online records become a part of streamlined communications, all while adding to waste reduction, improved record reliability, organization and security.
Hone in on Customer Satisfaction
Most VoIP features intrinsically boost customer satisfaction by making practices easier to reach and work with. VoIP call centers also offer tools like post-call surveys and IVR-powered self-service offerings – both of which enhance patient experience monitoring and customer satisfaction. Additional low-cost features like VoIP toll-free and vanity numbers build credibility while making it easier for customers to reach you.
Bring Your Practice into the Digital Age
While issues with data security and industry competition have hindered the medical field’s efforts to leverage new technology, the past decade was home to a burst of healthcare digitization. That means now is a chance for practices to benefit from the growing pains of those early adopters, as many of the hurdles to integration are a thing of the past.
Interested in switching from landline to VoIP, but unsure of where to start? Download our white paper to learn more about the transition process.
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