What is Interactive Voice Response?
Interactive voice response, or IVR, is a type of telephone system that interacts with most users through voice commands. Most people have some experience with interactive voice response systems, simply by calling a large corporate business. As the costs have come down, even many smaller businesses are beginning to use the technology. When calling into a call center, it is usually fairly easy to determine if you are speaking to an actual person or recorded message. If the message gives you options, then you are using an interactive voice response system. As you give information, you get a voice response. Most interactive voice response systems are handled in one of two ways. Either the caller inputs information through the telephone keys or through voice recognition software. If using telephone keys, the interactive voice response software is able to determine which key is pressed by using that key’s specific dual tone multi frequency (DTMF). Each telephone key produces a high frequency
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is a phone system application that prompts callers with recorded messages and options and processes voice input and/or touch-phone keypad selections from these menus. The IVR script responds to this input by providing appropriate information in the form of voice answer or provides a connection to a “live” operator. Other terms for this application are AVR (automated voice response) and ARU (automatic response unit). IVR can also be just one component of many other phone functions including automatic call distribution, database access, voice message broadcasting and automatic dialing processes.
Interactive Voice Response prompts callers with pre-recorded messages and options and can process a callers command through touchpad or voice. The Interactive Voice Response script provides the appropriate information through voice or will provide a connection to a customer support representative. Interactive Voice Response is also referred to as Automated Voice Response and Automatic Response Unit. Interactive voice response can also be just one component of many other inbound call functions.
IVR provides automated access to information and services over the phone. It integrates a company’s telephone and computer system to become a voice computer that transforms the caller’s telephone into a terminal capable of directly accessing information and services. IVR answers inquiries by prompting callers to input data onto the touchtone keypad, looking up the record in a database and speaking back information. It can also ask the caller for information, accept the answers as they are entered on the keypad and store the information in a database. Being a voice computer, an IVR system is capable of many-advanced transaction processing tasks.
