To understand what comprises a Green Call Center let’s first look at what keeps a traditional call center from being Green.

1. Using an equipment based, site based call center platform, requiring replication at each site,  takes a tremendous amount of energy, not only to run the equipment but also to keep it cool.  For example, at an energy cost of $1.65 per square foot, at a 100 seat agent call center costs $13,200 per year in unnecessary power and gas bills.

1. Call center agents work onsite.  This means that each agent must use some means of transportation to get to work each day.  For many, transportation is their car which not only consumes gasoline (natural resources), but spews carbon emissions – which contribute to our poor air quality.

2.  Having agents work onsite is a waste of space and resources.  With virtualization technologies such as virtual call center platforms, most employees could work from home.  In the work from home scenario, companies would not require large buildings which use up our natural resources to build, and similarly take up space that could be used as preservation areas such as parks.

 Now let’s take a look at a Green Call Center.  In a Green call center, the organization uses a virtual call center platform which allows them to have their agents work from home.  Virtual call center platforms provide a call center with all the features, functionality and management tools as equipment based, site based platforms plus offer “on demand” functionality which allows virtual platforms to deploy easily and scale up or down very quickly.  Call centers directors with their agents working from home have found it just as easy to manage their agents in this environment as it was when they were working onsite.  By employing a private social network, agents can communicate, ask questions and share ideas even more effectively as they previously could at the “water cooler”.  Moreover,  this  information of an often valuable nature, can be stored, contributing to the company’s knowledge base.

 Having call center agents work from home saves a company a small fortune in energy costs and will dramatically reduce carbon emissions.  For a 200 agent call center utilizing a work at home model, with an average daily commute of 20 miles, and telecommuting 5 days per week, the savings would be tremendous:

409,471 kwh of energy saved
462 tons of C02 emissions reduced
29,384 gallons of gas saved

Virtual Call Center – The Benefits to Employees

Added benefits include that employees save money on gasoline and are usually able to obtain lower priced car insurance if they work from home.  According to companies using the work from home model, their employees are happier and more productive.  Doesn’t it make sense that far more people would rather work from the comfort of their homes, in a t-shirt and sweat pants than getting dressed up, dealing with traffic and working out of a cubicle under fluorescent lighting?  Of course it does.

 Virtual Call Center – Benefits to the Company

They are able to radically reduce their energy and facility costs.

• Hiring new agents no longer needs to be limited to those that live within a 60 mile radius of the call center.  They can now hire agents anywhere without any geographical restrictions. 
• Call centers can now have a much larger talent pool to hire from.
• Call centers can now take advantage of the tremendous workforce of disabled individuals who might not have been able to work in a traditional call center environment.
• By using virtualization technologies and using “at home” agents, an organization is able to achieve their Green initiatives.

Why would a company want to waste money and resources to have their call center agents work from a traditional call center when they can save money, reduce energy consumption, reduce emissions, and help save natural resources by using a virtual call center platform with agents working from home?  One answer might be fear.  They might be afraid that if they do not have both equipment and agents onsite, they will have less control and less ability to run and manage their call center as they have in the past.  This, of course, is a fallacy.  Having equipment onsite only means more human resources are required to manage and maintain the equipment.  In a virtual, hosted environment, there is no equipment to manage so more time can be devoted to managing, training and developing call center agents.

There are no rational reasons for a call center to not “Go Green”, virtualize and utilize at-home call center agents.  Call centers can seamlessly virtualize their contact center, save a fortune in facility and energy costs, help save the planet and enjoy a happier and more qualified workforce.