Free trade zone gets wired up to boost customer service

One of the fastest growing free trade zones in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is depending on a Cisco partner to streamline communications among locators in the zone.

The task to wire up Ras Al Khaimah Free Trade Zone (RAK FTZ) at service levels fell on the hands of Arc Solutions, whose unified communications solutions work with the Cisco IP telephony system already being used in the zone.

Home to more than 4,000 companies, mostly small and medium-sized, from 106 countries around the world, the RAK FTZ is positioning itself as the "gateway to the world" because of its strategic location in the Middle East.

The zone is divided into four parks -- Business Park, Industrial Park, Technology Park and Academy Zone -- and all will be connected to the unified communications network, allowing companies to do real-time chatting, IP telephony, video conferencing and other state-of-the-art communications.

Customer service

The technology investment, for an undisclosed amount, is intended to increase the productivity of more than 350 staff in the zone and enhance their customer service through proper call handling with the appropriate call metrics.

"RAK FTZ is a rapidly growing organization and Arc Solutions has helped us address the challenges we were facing in regard to call handling," said Oussama El Omari, CEO, RAK FTZ.

"As a customer-centric organization, using the latest technology is critical in successfully delivering our business plan -- which is why we turned to Arc Solutions to improve our customer service level within our Cisco IP telephony system and provide accurate metrics to ensure we meet our service level agreement to our customers."

To help the free trade zone meet its objectives, Arc Solution deployed the Arc Premium operator consoles to increase call handling efficiency and productivity in the operator center. The RAK FTZ is also using the Arc Call Connect to improve service levels and the effectiveness of contact center agents. Call center supervisors and managers, on the other hand, rely on the Arc Supervisor management tools and Arc Wallboard to monitor performance metrics to better address customer requirements.

The RAK FTZ is said to be competing with the other free trade zones in the region to attract companies to locate in their zone. It offers incentives, such as free taxes and 100 per cent ownership, aside from providing some of the latest communication technologies available in the market.

It also has an office in Abu Dhabi and international liaison offices in Istanbul, Mumbai, Cologne and the US to actively reach out to foreign companies wanting to do business in the Middle East.