Sierra Pacific Power Chooses Syntellect

PHOENIX, AZ - Syntellect Inc. (OTC BB: SYNL) a developer of speech-enabled self-service software solutions and hosted services, announced that Sierra Pacific Power has contracted with Syntellect to design and implement a customer-facing outage management, outage notification and self-service solution using its Vista IMR (Interactive Media Response) software platform. The strengths of multiple technologies including speech recognition, interactive voice response, text-to-speech synthesis, computer telephony integration and application hosting will be harnessed to create a solution to real world, utility customer service problems. Vista IMR gives callers self-service access to data, applications and transactions within an enterprise, thereby leveraging existing databases. Callers typically request information through natural language voice commands and can receive the information via their choice of voice, fax, email, wireless or the Web. "We want to deploy technology in a way that is easy for our customers to use, improves their service experience and helps us contain costs," said Carol Marin, vice president, Customer Service for Sierra Pacific Power. "Our customers will be able to report outages and the system will automatically call them back with restoration verification messages. Normal customer service inquiries involving power consumption, account history, current balances, payment information and options, and move in and move out service request scheduling will be handled via the automated system. We will even be able to provide customer interactive services including satisfaction surveys," she added. According to Filomena Gogel, managing director, Utility Customer Care, E Source, "A recent study that we conducted revealed that IVRs are a key driver of customer satisfaction for outage calls. The easier the system is to use and the quicker customers can obtain information, especially during outages, the more satisfied they will be when calling their utility company." "We went with Syntellect for three important reasons, said Susan Brennan, vice president and chief information officer for Sierra Pacific Power. Syntellect is a demonstrated leader in the industry, particularly regarding speech recognition implementations. They understand this industry. They've implemented winning solutions at other utilities and we're confident they'll do the same for us. Secondly, the solution uses open, standards-based hardware and software and readily fits into our overall IT architecture plan. Finally, their ability to offer a fully mirrored site in Syntellect's hosted services center providing redundant disaster recovery service imperceptible to our customers was a unique selling point and a valuable insurance policy for our company and our customers." "We are happy to see that progressive, sophisticated utilities like Sierra Pacific Power are investing in our technology and vertical market expertise to help them become more customer responsive," said Tony Carollo, chairman and CEO of Syntellect. "As Syntellect continues to add large electric and natural gas retailers to our customer base, we will further improve our ability to deliver customer pleasing, cost-compelling self-service solutions focused on the utility industry."