I worked in an inbound collection center at a telephone company - everyone was late on their bill or recently disconnected. And I foudn out, there are a myriad of reasons for this, depending on where you call.
Part of this is to verify identity and verify nothing went awry pulling up your account.
If the system even pulled up your account at all. The center I worked had people put in their information, but it didn't forward it to the call center worker. The main benefit of keying the information in is to get you to use the automated system first, but also to route you into the correct call que for your area.
You see, different states had different regulations on how fast you needed to answer the calls, some of those had penalties as well. In addition, hours are different in different time zones. Since we serviced coast to coast, this was rather important.
Additionally, there is an element of anger diffusion. Folks will call in screaming, yet will generally calm down a little while verifying everything. This is utterly helpful.
Part of this is to verify identity and verify nothing went awry pulling up your account.
If the system even pulled up your account at all. The center I worked had people put in their information, but it didn't forward it to the call center worker. The main benefit of keying the information in is to get you to use the automated system first, but also to route you into the correct call que for your area.
You see, different states had different regulations on how fast you needed to answer the calls, some of those had penalties as well. In addition, hours are different in different time zones. Since we serviced coast to coast, this was rather important.
Additionally, there is an element of anger diffusion. Folks will call in screaming, yet will generally calm down a little while verifying everything. This is utterly helpful.