Call centers: the history of their origin and development

The concept of customer service by telephone originated in the 1920s, and telephone operators were the first to provide such services, because at that time they had all the resources for this – a large staff and specialized equipment. It is worth noting that at that time telephone operators had to distribute calls manually.

The first automatic call distribution systems appeared only in the mid-1960s, which made it possible to automate the processing of incoming calls.

The number of existing call centers increased, and with it the number of dissatisfied customers who refused to pay for calls that were received by call service centers grew. In response to this, the multinational company AT&T introduced in 1967 a service created under the name "toll free" - a service of free calls to a special number with a non-geographic code "800". All calls to the number were paid for by the owner of the number, and the service was based on the technology of engineer Roy Weber, who at that time worked for a telecommunications company.

In the USSR, an example of a full-fledged call center of that time is the appearance of the legendary reference "09". Any resident of the Union, by calling the short number "09", could easily get interesting information and information about an institution or an individual, such as an address, phone number and many others. The well-known number "09" was assigned to the service in 1932, but only in 1948 it received the official name "Reference and Information Service 09".

In the 70s and 80s, call centers appeared in some European countries and the USA and became full-fledged business tools in their field. Coca-Cola was one of the first foreign companies to introduce a free call service, which served as a powerful incentive for the development of corporate call centers of that time.

The very term "call center" from the English "call center" - call processing center, was included in the Oxford Dictionary only in 1983. In the same year, he was mentioned in the journal Data Communications International: "A call center is an enterprise that is provided with the necessary personnel and equipment to process a large number of phone calls." At its core, "call center", as it is now, means a specialized organization that processes requests and informs via voice communication channels in the interests of the customer organization.

Thus, in the 90s, with the development of the market economy and the emergence of a large number of commercial organizations interested in attracting and retaining their customers, the call center industry was born in Russia.