Contact Centers are a central touchpoint for customer experience – with lower wait times, agent understanding and the ability to resolve problems satisfactorily key to maintaining loyalty and brand reputation.
Since the pandemic, Microsoft Teams, so helpfully integrated with other Microsoft tools, has become a much-demanded addition to Contact Center communication architecture, enhancing traditional platforms or even replacing them with ‘pure’ Teams solutions.
This has had a huge knock-on effect on call recording, which has a key role to play in compliance, security and service improvement in many Contact Centers. Choose wisely, and you can have a single recording solution that captures calls across platforms and supports key business goals; make recording an afterthought, and you risk the expense and inconvenience of multiple solutions and even potential compliance breeches.
Choosing a Contact Center Recording Solution for Teams: Key Features to Look For
First thing’s first: It’s important to know what you need from recording, and when it comes to Contact Centers, that’s most often compliance and performance improvement.
Whilst regulations vary across industries and regions, they typically require secure capture and storage, controlled access to records, the prevention of unauthorized deletion, and the omission of sensitive card payment details.
Successful sales and service provision, on the other hand, is concerned with training and supporting staff to provide the best possible customer experience and business outcomes.
When combined with the need for a solution that works perfectly with your Contact Center platform and Microsoft Teams, these are the features to look out for:
- Microsoft Teams certification – Underpins security and the ability to capture all call types
- Cloud-based recording – Removes the need for inhouse upkeep
- Call routing compatibility – Works with your system e.g. Operator Connect, Direct Routing, Contact Center etc.
- Voice, video, and screen- sharing recording – Ensures nothing is missed
- Speech-to-text transcription – Assists information retrieval, compliance monitoring and assessment
- Policy-based access – Limits access to necessary parties only
- 256-bit AES encryption – Prevents tampering
- Customizable recording rules – Define which numbers are/aren’t recorded
- Longterm, region-specific storage – Supports regional compliance regulations
- PCI DSS compliant options – Prevents exposure of card payment details
- Best practice playlists – Supports ongoing training
- Assessment tools – Measures performance and provide feedback
The intersection of Contact Centers, Teams and Call Recording
With Teams a must-have in your Contact Center, the type of Contact Center platform you use will also impact your recording options. Let’s break it down:
Option 1: Recording for traditional Contact Center platforms + Teams
If you’re already using a Contact Center platform, then bringing in Teams as an add-on may seem the simplest way forward, but it can quickly become complicated when factoring in recording.
Whilst some platforms offer inbuilt recording, this tends to be basic and lacking in compliance features such as encryption, role-based access and secure storage.
If compliance level recording is included, check whether it covers all your Teams calls as well, notably any PSTN and mobile calls as well as simply Teams-to-Teams calls and meetings. If not, a third-party recorder will be needed.
If there’s no inbuilt recording at all, then you ideally want a compliant recording set-up that captures all types of calls across both platforms and makes them available within a single point of access. What this looks like in practice largely depends on the original platform – you may still end up paying out for two separate recording systems. So, ask the awkward questions.
Finally, it’s worth knowing that Contact Center providers usually have formal agreements with Teams recording vendors and will promote their products. Remember that as the customer you are free to choose who to go with, so it’s worth shopping around for the best price, features etc. to meet your needs.
Option 2: Recording for ‘pure’ Teams Contact Center platforms
Contact Centers were initially reluctant to move over entirely to Teams and lose the advanced functionality of established platforms. However, there are a growing number of ‘pure’ Teams Contact Center solutions now offering these more advanced capabilities, such as Altigen, Conversant, Luware, ROGER365.io and Teleware. Recording calls using these platforms is much more straightforward.
These solutions make it much simpler to pick from the range of Microsoft certified compliance recording solutions out there, knowing they can readily capture, process and store all call types as needed. Some have even collaborated with third party recording vendors to integrate recording directly into their platform, so you can hit the ground running.
How Oak can help
We specialise in Microsoft certified call recording for Teams. Our ClarifyGo recording solution can record Teams in any Contact Center environment, and we already work closely with specialist Teams Contact Center vendors including Altigen, Conversant, ROGER365.io, and Teleware.
For more information sales@oakinnovate.com or book a demo with us today.