Nuance Solution Brings Self-Service Directly to Consumers on Their Mobile Phones

Nuance Communications, Inc. announced Nuance Mobile Care, an easy-to-use mobile phone application that engages the mobile consumer in a new customer care experience. By simply dialing the care number of their wireless provider, Nuance Mobile Care enables callers to check their balance, pay their bill, or perform other care tasks directly on the mobile screen. Nuance has already signed its first wireless carrier for the solution, selected because of the application’s ease of access and intuitive navigation, which it expects to drive adoption and high success rates.

Each month, more than 250 million calls are placed to customer care by U.S. wireless subscribers that wait an average of three minutes to speak to an agent. Even with Web, WAP and IVR automation in place, the U.S. wireless industry spends more than $7 billion each year in agent costs to serve their subscribers. Nuance Mobile Care re-defines customer care through effortless access, personalization and a highly responsive user experience. The experience provided enables carriers to increase self-service automation rates, thereby improving customer satisfaction and driving down agent costs.

“Nuance is first introducing the powerful Nuance Mobile Care framework for mobile service providers worldwide,” said Mikael Berner, vice president and general manager, Nuance On-Demand. “What’s so captivating about this solution is that consumers love the experience. Rather than hoping to avoid calling customer care, we’ve found people prefer to access their account information via Mobile Care, preferring it over Web, touchtone or WAP service. Nuance Mobile Care is the latest milestone in our mission to serve the world’s consumers and transform customer care as we know it.”

Nuance Mobile Care creates a highly engaging and new channel of communication that drives an exchange of value between the carrier and their subscribers. Carriers slash agent costs, reinforce their brand and drive loyalty; subscribers get what they want – fast, relevant service.

“In the past, motivated by the high cost of live agent customer care, carriers have attempted to find a way to improve self-service for the Anywhere Consumer through mobile Web and WAP solutions,” said Ken Landoline, program manager, Customer-Centric Strategies at Yankee Group. “The solutions were hard to locate on the mobile handset and the interfaces left a lot to be desired. The resulting low usage levels did not translate into carrier savings. The Nuance announcement describes a solution that improves the customer experience, cuts the cost of providing service and drives incremental carrier revenues. This can be a win/win situation for everyone.”