Technology group BCX has established an on-demand contact centre for the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) and the Department of Health (DoH) to assist with the overwhelming influx of queries being received.

The contact centre on demand (CCOD), implemented within 48 hours, aims to provide a platform for the public to contact the NICD and DoH for the answers to questions and report any Covid-19 symptoms during the pandemic that is currently making its way through South Africa.

“The NICD required a contact centre which had the flexibility to expand at a moment’s notice. The initial request was for five agents, upped to 40 agents, and they expect growth up to 300 agents to man the Covid-19 call centre,” BCX CEO Jonas Bogoshi told Engineering News & Mining Weekly.

The solution enables NICD the flexibility of expanding rapidly depending on demand, offers a simple user interface, boasts good voice quality over the BCX Next Generation Voice Network and ensures the public will be able to reach an available nurse or doctor on demand.

It is also available as a mobile solution, which enables agents and doctors to work from home and facilitates easy upscaling of the workforce.

A CCOD had also been established for Allan Gray to provide voice channel interactions for agents working from home.

The solution for the 100-seater centre encompasses both in- and outbound interactions and provides recording of interactions, including real-time and historical reporting capabilities.

The requirements included some complex call flow development so that the experience, from a customer point of view, remained consistent, even though they were using an entirely different platform.

Meanwhile, BCX is implementing tracking and tracing technology to enable the effective tracking of Covid-19 patients and tracing those who may have been exposed to them.

“With Covid-19 sweeping the world, the role that technology can play to prevent, track and monitor outbreaks of this nature is becoming clear. Data has been critical to mapping the global threat of the virus and finding new ways to collect, map and track this data will continue to be a major focus,” Bogoshi said.

The system will enable South Africa to deal more effectively with Covid-19. Based on the data collected, the potentially exposed patients can be contacted efficiently and ensure medical consumables are delivered where they are most needed at the appropriate time.

The largest disruption and the most strain at this time is undoubtedly on healthcare services, as this virus appeared out of nowhere and has overwhelmed local services and hospitals alike.

In such a desperate situation, technology – and the advances in technology like Internet of Things and artificial intelligence - may be able to alleviate some of the largest strains on doctors and nurses simply by making remote appointments possible, and making sure that high-risk patients do not have to leave their home to receive their usual treatment.