2002 NYS Webmasters Guild "Best of the Web" Award Winners

State Government
Department of Motor Vehicles
DMV On-line Customer Service Knowledge Base
http://fornax.dmv.state.ny.us/scripts/rightnow.cfg/php.exe/enduser/std_alp.php (External Link)

Summary and Background

The DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) web site was launched in 1996 and provided customers e-mail access to contact the DMV if they had a question. By the year 2000, the volume of e-mail received via the web site reached an average of 200 inquiries per day and was growing. Managing and distributing web site e-mail occupied 90% of work time for one professional staff member and several hours per week for "e-mail liaisons" throughout the agency who responded to e-mail. DMV determined that up to 45% of customer questions were clearly and completely answered at the DMV web site, but each e-mail inquiry had to be individually managed and answered. Managing customer e-mail also required the services of up to six Call Center representatives working at least part-time on e-mail. In some cases, representatives worked overtime to address backlogs.

In June 2000, with research by the DMV Webmaster, DMV learned about a product called RightNow Web eService Center™ (RNW) marketed by RightNow Technologies, Inc. The primary advantages that RNW offered included:

  • An on-line knowledge base interface, integrated with the web site, to assist customers in finding answers to frequently asked questions.
  • Better management of incoming customer inquiries through a web-based Incident Console, and by using RNW workflow rules and escalation rules.
  • A reporting utility that allows detailed analysis of how customers were using the site and how DMV associates were performing in responding to inquiries.
  • RightNow Technologies verified that the product was fully compliant with the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. The knowledge base and questions pages are very compatible with screen readers used by the visually impaired, as subsequently confirmed through informal testing by the Office for Technology.

After researching other available products and testing RNW, DMV purchased RNW in November 2000. DMV then performed the following development work to prepare for implementation of the customer service knowledge base:

  • constructed the knowledge base of common questions and answers arranged by subject category and sub-category;
  • customized RNW with changes to the default configuration, including the appearance of the customer interface, to better support the needs of DMV customers and to fit the look and feel of the rest of web site;
  • developed workflow rules to help manage distribution of incoming inquiries; and
  • trained the associates who would be responding to customer inquires received through the Incident Console.

DMV launched the DMV Customer Service page using RNW on September 17, 2001.

Technology Overview

DMV uses Right Now Technologies "Right Now Web 4.x" product. Right Now Web (RNW) provides several modules; DMV uses the following: Knowledge Base, Metrics, Workflow Management, and Reporting. RNW also provides two web-based applications for accessing the knowledge base, one for customers and one for administrators and knowledge-workers. These applications run on our web server (in-house) on a Windows NT-based platform. The web applications talk to a back-end SQL database where all of the incidents/answers (i.e., the knowledge base) and all the configuration data are kept. RNW also provides integration with our e-mail platform. In addition to being able to send out automated e-mail responses to customer inquiries, RNW also has the ability to parse inbound e-mail and then locate and update the original incident with new information from the customer.

Although we did not make use of RNW on-site consulting to implement this project, we did make use of their support system as well as several conference calls with their support staff during our initial rollout.

Functionality

The DMV customer service knowledge base allows site visitors to search for answers to their questions through keyword searches or by browsing subject categories and sub-categories. The knowledge base currently gives customers access to more than 260 answers to questions that DMV customers often ask. These customers receive answers instantly, and do not have to wait several days for a DMV associate to research, prepare and send an answer by e-mail. The knowledge base is closely integrated with the web site, linking customers directly to related web site content that helps to provide a complete answer to the question.

When customers enter the DMV web site home page, they have a choice of several ways to use the site. In addition to a home page menu that offers access to general information and several online transactions, customers can choose to view a site map, or they can click on the "Find Answers" logo or text link to access the DMV knowledge base.

Once in the knowledge base, customers enter keywords or select categories and subcategories to quickly locate answers to their questions. Those who do not immediately find answers have the opportunity to ask a question. When a customer submits the question, RNW searches the knowledge base based on keywords in the customer's question and presents a list of likely answers to the question. This provides extremely fast service to customers and greatly reduces the number of repetitive, routine customer inquires that DMV must process.

If a customer doesn't find their answer, they can submit a question, and it becomes an "incident" in the RNW Incident Console where a DMV associate can access it and answer it. Workflow rules developed by DMV help to efficiently route many inquiries directly to the DMV units best able to answer the question. For example, inquiries from customers who choose the subcategory "Where is My Photo Document?" go directly to the License Production Bureau, which handles inquiries about photo licenses and other photo documents that have not been received in the mail. Incidents not routed by workflow rules go the representatives in the DMV telephone Call Center who then route incidents to the appropriate units for a response to the customer.

DMV's RNW Administrator uses the product's reporting function to routinely monitor and analyze customer use of the knowledge base to seek improvement opportunities and to keep managers informed of the agency's performance in promptly answering customer questions via the Incident Console.

Efficiencies Associated with this Site

Prior to implementing the customer service knowledge base, DMV received more than 200 e-mails per day from web site customers. The number of e-mails received per day had steadily increased and was expected to increase further as the number of customers using the DMV web site continued to expand.

The average number of customer inquires per day using the most recent configuration of the knowledge base is approximately 33 per day. This is an 83.5% reduction in the volume of inquiries when compared with DMV's experience using traditional e-mail, before implementing the knowledge base. The DMV Call Center is now able to manage incoming inquiries using only two representatives, both on a part-time basis, compared with up to six representatives, some of whom worked overtime to address periodic backlogs.

Service to Customers

Before implementing RNW, web site customers used traditional e-mail to interact with DMV. A customer could expect to wait from two days to a few weeks to receive an answer. In many cases, the answer that a customer waited several days to receive was already available on the DMV web site.

RNW allows the customer to quickly search a robust knowledge base with hundreds of answers to common questions. Instead of waiting days or weeks for answers, customers often locate them in seconds or minutes.

DMV analysis suggests that at least 97% of customers who use the "Find Answers" knowledge base locate the information they need immediately, without the need to wait for a DMV associate to read and respond to their questions. Overall, less than 1% of all knowledge base users submit questions.

One key to a 97% self-service rate is careful planning, along with analysis of inquiries submitted by customers, in order to arrange knowledge base answers into categories and sub-categories that customers understand. To achieve this high rate of self-service, DMV has revised the categories and sub-categories in the knowledge base twice since implementing RNW. The changes were based on extensive analysis of the keywords used by customers to search for answers, the categories and subcategories customers used for particular types of questions, and the content of customer questions. In-depth analysis of how customers frame their questions has helped DMV make the knowledge base much more usable and effective.

DMV has also made numerous changes to the configuration and look and feel of RNW to better communicate with customers and to assist them in using the knowledge base effectively.

Date Launched

September 17, 2001

Approximate Number of Monthly Unique Visitors

83,000 user sessions on knowledge base usages out of 229,000 total DMV web site visitors

Site Developers

George Filieau
Richard Vang
Joanne Coffey
Carole MacGregor
Dave Schuchman
Claire Guidici

Contact:

George Filieau
Department of Motor Vehicles
6 ESP
Albany, NY 12228
(518) 486-6596
gfili@dmv.state.ny.us