NEWS REVIEW
RINGING THE CHANGES
The Coventry Sports Foundation, is a charitable trust that was started in the mid eighties
by ex-world record 5000m runner David Moorcroft. The Foundation was established with a
mission to provide a wide range of sporting, recreational, educational, and social activities to
under represented, and disadvantaged community groups and individuals within Coventry.
he Foundation has three sports centres;
T
The Midland Sports Centre, Centre AT7
and The Alan Higgs Centre, all of which
are located in the Coventry area, and together
employ around 175 staff.
Challenge
The Foundation offers a diverse range of sports and
recreational facilities. Outdoor activities include, kayaking
and orienteering whilst traditional indoor pursuits
encompass a gymnastics facility and other general fitness
activities. The Foundation also has a thriving lifestyle
health & fitness programme that is available to its
customers via its various membership schemes. version of its incumbent system, the Foundation was explains, “70-80% of our staff are under 25 and whilst
As with many leisure centres the biggest challenge introduced by its technology partner HBT to an entirely this provides the Foundation with a high degree of
facing staff on a daily basis is ensuring that the new concept in telephony. The solution from Swyx used energy and dynamism it also brings with it a high
telephone bookings are processed efficiently whilst at VoIP (Voice over the Internet Protocol) technology and number of 'lifestyle' absenteeism problems. In the past it
the same time ensuring that there are no queues in the was entirely software based. This made it an ideal was easy to report in sick, the staff member just called
reception areas. Chief Executive at the Foundation, Paul solution to the Foundation's telephony problems. Paul reception and left a message for their supervisor. Using
Breed describes the problem, “Receptions at leisure Breed explains, “When HBT introduced us to Swyx, we the Swyx system we have now implemented a 'sick line'
centres are very busy places, the staff have to manage a were all blown away, we did not know that such whereby calls are now routed directly to each
constant stream of visitors, plus answer the phone and technology existed, one by one HBT demonstrated how individual's manager. This has led to a dramatic
take bookings. This can be a major headache at the best each of our issues could be not only be solved, but also reduction in days lost through 'illness'.
of times, but when you have to manage facilities the new system could revolutionise the way in which we According to Paul Breed the key benefits the
distributed across three centres it can often result in could run the leisure centres.” Foundation has enjoyed since deploying the Swyx
missed bookings, unhappy customers and lost revenue. The results solution are as follows:
For example if 20 ladies turn-up for an aerobic class, The key difference between the Swyx solution and • Increased the number of bookings for all three
whilst at the same time several people are calling to others supplying old TDM (circuit switched) or hybrid centres by routing booking calls to a single number.
book badminton courts or other facilities, then either the telephone systems is that the Swyx solution could run on This freed up the reception staff to deal with
phone doesn't get answered and we lose the booking, or an organisation's existing computer network, without customers directly
the ladies are left waiting at reception. This was a key the need for proprietary hardware or cabling systems. • The new call routing has enabled the company to
issue for us. I would regularly walk past our reception This enabled the foundation to create a 'virtual' network capture almost every call that comes in resulting in
areas and hear the phone constantly ringing. However between the three sites so that in practice they became a increased facility bookings and a significant increase
we recognised that the main problem was not with our single entity. in leisure centre membership
staff, but with our incumbent telephone system, it was Paul Breed comments on the results so far, “We have • Internal and external calls can be routed to the
not flexible enough to provide a 'real-time' centralised had the system for over 3 years now and quite simply it specific manager or member of staff regardless of
booking system”. has revolutionised our operation. Customers can now their location
The Foundation also needs to market itself and still call each centre separately, but the system routes all • Each member of staff has the facility to set-up and
attract new members to its leisure club. According to the calls to a telephone receptionist based at the Alan manage their own telephony profile, this is simple to
Breed the old system let them down here as well. He Higgs centre who answer in the name of the centre do and negates the need to call out an engineer.
explains, “The revenue we receive from our called. This not only provides a personal service, but • Manager and key members of staff can work
membership fees is critical to our overall funding also enables the receptionist to make bookings for all remotely and still be available
requirements. The old system was very cumbersome and three centres. If she is busy then the calls route to the • The Foundation reduced its overall telephone bill by
inflexible. If all three of our consultants were busy then next available member of staff. The result is that we can 70%
any incoming call - a new membership enquiry for answer virtually all the inbound calls without • The introduction of a 'call-in sick' system has
example -would be lost.” compromising the front desk operation.” reduced absenteeism by over 20%
He continues, “Another issue was cost, our According to Breed another advantage the • Call recording is used for training and quality control
management team and staff were distributed over the three Foundation now enjoy is the 'presence feature', Paul Summary
centres and 70% of each centre's outbound calls are to the explains, “staff can move around the three centres and as Paul Breed summarises the experience of using
other centres resulting in unnecessarily high telephone soon as they log-in they are available. The receptionist Swyx so far, “ The key benefit is that telephony traffic
bills. What we needed was a centralised, integrated just transfers the call in the normal way and the system is now directed to where it needs to be. This has made a
solution so that all of the centres were part of the same will find them its as simple as that. Staff can also major difference to our front desk operations where
telephone system, so that calls between sites were free and manage their profile, set the times of day they are bookings are near capacity and the memberships for our
bookings could be processed via a single number.” available and redirect calls to their mobiles or voice life style health and fitness programmes has increased
The Solution mail. In the past any move or change we wanted by 50% since the installation. The feedback from our
The opening of the Alan Higgs centre provided the required an engineer to be called out to site, which was customers is also good as they are finding it much easier
Foundation with the opportunity review and rationalise not only time consuming, but very expensive!” to contact us. Finally, the support we receive from HBT
its telephone system and the communications between Another unexpected benefit that the system provided is excellent, and because it is all networked, problems
its 3 centres. After initially considering an upgraded was a significant reduction in staff absenteeism, Paul are solved almost instantly”. FSA
September/October 2008 | FOOTBALL & SPORTS ARENA | 7
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