The call centre is part of a triad which includes the global reservation network Galileo and the Citibank payment gateway. The caller can book a ticket, pay for it through Citibank and arrive at the airport armed with an e-ticket which is no more than the PNR number. This helps the airline cut both ticketing and call center costs.
The country is ga-ga over Indian BPO companies responding to calls from all over the world, but what about the domestic scene?
It is a market that has been informally estimated to grow to over Rs 1,000 crore by 2005 but there are till now mostly regional players.
Customer First Services, is the largest domestic company and perhaps the only one with a national reach, run by a group of professionals formally with Hutchison and promoted by a few domestic and international telecom technocrats.
Its 600 agents work out of centres in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kochi, Pune Coimbatore and Kolkata and offer multi-lingual services, says Sandip Sen, chief executive.
Customer First is just over two years old and clocked a turnover of Rs 7.2 crore last year. This is projected to reach Rs 19 core in the current year (2003-04). It is already a profit making company, having earned a net post tax profit of Rs 45 lakh and a cash profit of Rs 1 crore in 2002-03.
