Virtual customer sales and service center and method

Abstract

A virtual customer sales and service center is disclosed that connects a customer to a customer access resource through any access method at any time from any customer location. The virtual customer sales and service center includes customer access resources which can both meet customer needs and also acquire and retrieve customer information during a contact, a computer telephony system for gathering interaction data associated with the contact, a rule based routing system for identifying a resource best suited to handle the call and a switch for routing the contact to the identified employee. A customer information database and an employee profile database are included, wherein the best suited resource is identified as having a skill corresponding to the type of customer ascertained from the customer information database and to the retrieved customer information. A context manager and a plurality of service providers are provided. The context manager coordinates access to an appropriate service provider and provides the service provider the context to complete the transaction and interfaces to the rule based routing system. A quality center is included for integrating and aiding in management of a plurality of physical resource locations as a single virtual resource center.