“COVID-19 spurred a mass transition to a virtual environment, with public-facing federal agencies’ customer service phone lines experiencing large influxes of incoming queries about health care benefits. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is now using enhanced data management and automation to improve its call center modernization strategy and improve customer experience.”
“’With over 10,000 people aging into Medicare a day, the challenge is to maintain the high level of customer service, while expanding and improving other channels for people to get their information,’ a CMS spokesperson told GovernmentCIO Media & Research. ‘Our call volume has been fairly consistent as a result of advanced data analytics. These analytics allow us to focus on reducing the need for repeat calls, finding and addressing root cause issues and increasing the information available on other channels.'”
“As agencies across government work to accommodate increased communication through online platforms, CMS experienced a new variety of challenges.”
“’We became more adept at handling the full range of inquiries we would typically see only through our phone channel versus the historical ‘account-related’ questions we would get online,’ the spokesperson said. ‘For both the 1-800 MEDICARE and Federal Marketplace Call Center, providing a world-class customer experience continues to be a driving priority.'”
“One of the agency’s largest customer service efforts is eMedicare, which is improving the omni-channel customer experience for Medicare beneficiaries. The multi-year project is designed to bring Medicare customer service channels up to date and create a more modern, personalized and seamless customer experience…”
“The agency is also looking into the role of automation to see how it can support CMS’ customers. CMS’ recent enhancements to its automated system, interactive voice response (IVR), enabled the agency to deliver information to Medicare customers via text message. CMS also redesigned Medicare IVR with more self-service options…” Read the full article here.
Source: Digital Services Improve CMS Call Center Operations – By Sarah Sybert, August 20, 2021. GovernmentCIO.
