Humaid opens new Etisalat centre
(Dubai | By A Staff Reporter | 01/10/2001)

His Highness Sheikh Humaid bin Rashid Al Nuaimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Ajman, yesterday opened Etisalat's new Dh80 million Contact Centre in Ajman as part of the Corporation's extensive customer service development programme.

"I am very pleased to announce the opening of this state-of-the-art call centre in Ajman. This is evidence of the high quality services provided by Etisalat to its customers, and the key role the Corporation is playing in developing the country," said Sheikh Humaid after opening and touring of the new centre.

Ahmed Humaid Al Tayer, Minister of Communications and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Etisalat, senior Etisalat officials, and heads of local public departments attended the inauguration ceremony.

The Minister delivered a speech on the occasion in which he thanked Sheikh Humaid for "your endless support" in helping to meet the objective of setting up a support centre for all Etisalat products and services.

"This remarkable progress and development by the Corporation in the emirate of Ajman is due to your full and continuous support for this project," Al Tayer addressed the Ruler.

Al Tayer said that the opening of the new Centre coincided with Etisalat's celebrations of its 25th anniversary.

"In honour of this occasion, we would like to extend our deep thanks and greetings to President His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, and His Highness Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, and the Members of the Supreme Council for their continuous support for the Corporation," said the Minister.

The Contact Centre will manage all Etisalat's non-face-to-face interactions with its customers throughout the country and abroad.

It will provide 24-hour customer contact services over multiple communications media in a secure environment. This includes directory enquiries as well as toll free help-lines, fault reporting and tracking, and many other queries.

"Advances in the field of communications technology have seen call centres with a stand-alone telephone and PC evolve into contact centres with integrated systems combining voice, web, e-mail and data all connected to customer information databases," said Mohamed Bamakhrama, General Manager of the Contact Centre, adding that by opening its new Centre in Ajman, Etisalat had brought its total investments in the emirate into Dh200 million.

"At full capacity, the Centre will be able to accommodate up to 600 customer service representatives," he said, adding that the Centre was fully operational with almost 70 per cent of its workforce being UAE nationals.

Bamakhrama said customers would avail themselves of a variety of services, including fault reporting, technical support, transactions processing, and directory enquiry service covering the whole country.

"For EIM customers, the Centre offers technical support, fault reporting, billing and general enquiries, while E-Vision customers can obtain general information, set-up sales appointments, report faults, and discuss billing issues.

"Additionally, the Centre provides information and technical support to Comtrust and Thuraya customers," said Bamakhrama, adding that the Centre offers full information and support of all products and services, including helping customers subscribe to these products.

The Centre is fully operational 24 hours throughout the week. It handles all kinds of services related to telephones, Internet, e-mail, text chats, web forms, IP telephony, faxes, letters, and other services.

"Any Etisalat customers can call 101 and make use of the same services they could obtain by visiting a regional office or business centre. It also provides helpdesk facilities for Emirates Internet and Multimedia and other facilities," said Bamakhrama, adding that for those who wish to set up their own call centres, the Centre would provide a consultancy service covering the entire process from business analysis through resource planning to training and evaluation.

For clients who want to establish and staff a call centre, but do not want the expense of setting up their own facility, the Centre will provide space and full equipment, including furniture, computers, telephones, and headsets.

"This arrangement includes access to the latest Etisalat technology and expertise. The client only has to supply the staff," said Bamakhrama.