Every industry has a version of the ultimate outcome. In manufacturing, it's zero defects. In transportation, it's on-time departures and early arrivals. For contact centers, it's first-call resolution, in which the communication doesn't have to be routed to other agents, who are presumably more skilled and expensive to employ, and callers don't have to call back to get what they need.

Government agencies have an economic reason to upgrade and automate as many contact center features as they can. Celent, a consulting firm, estimates that it costs $6.85 per call when someone answers the phone to serve a customer. Forrester Research found that the cost can be as high as $15 per call. Interactive voice response (IVR) technology can reduce that to as little as 40 cents per call.

Of course, most agencies don't get 32 million calls a year to their toll-free numbers like the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in Baltimore does. That volume explains why CMS has linked its IVR platform to customer relationship management (CRM) software, which authenticates callers and summons their records before an agent answers the phone.

That step shortens calls by 20 seconds on average, said Mary Agnes Laureno, director of CMS' Beneficiary Information Services Group. That's a significant savings considering CMS' calling volume and boost to agent productivity, she added.

For government officials looking to transform contact centers, one option is to integrate the center's system with enterprise software. Some other options are ready, while others are still in development. Some are affordable, while others are not. For government users, two considerations dictate the decisions: budget and need.

Press '1' for VOIP

Voice over IP (VOIP) is probably a slam-dunk for contact centers. Its ability to combine voice and data applications on a single network infrastructure is well-documented.

With VOIP-based call centers, network administrators can install the service software at one location and use a standard IP network to add agents regardless of their locations, creating virtual contact groups. For example, the network could route a call to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to the closest agent or a part-time worker who had been added after a disaster.

Although VOIP can deliver 99.999 percent availability, converting voice to data packets often uncovers weak links in an agency's network, possibly disrupting VOIP service, said Russell Brodsky, sales director for the federal solutions division of Siemens Communications.