ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries Ju n e 1 9 9 4 /3 4 3 Voice m ail at the reference desk By Paul F risch and J o h n J . Small An alternative to busy signals and long waits on “hold” T he University of Illinois at Chicago (UICMain Library’s Reference Department ha recently adopted a voice mail answering sys tem that allows us to serve clients physicall present at the reference desk without the dis traction of endlessly ringing telephones, ye maintain our commitment to quality phone ser vice. During FY 1991-92, the reference staf answered 17,312 phone queries. With this ne system, the calls are automatically shunted t the voice mail system after the third ring, o when the reference line is busy. The technology involved in the voice mai system can be complex, but from the client’ point of view it functions as an answering ma chine, albeit a high-tech version. UIC’s tele communications system can accommodate u to 27 simultaneous callers. An individual voic mail account can store a maximum of 48 mes sages. Each message can be up to four minute in length. Many other systems and capabilitie are available, with costs for full-blown system ranging from about $17,000 to $500,000.1 Ther are also lower-cost, microcomputer-based voic mail systems, usually operating from a singl phone line.2 Voice m ail alternative Once the head of reference decided that voic mail might improve the quality o f both in-per son and telephone reference, while reducin stress at the Reference Desk, library adminis tration and members o f the Reference Depart ) s ­ y ­ t ­ f w o r l s ­ ­ p e ­ s s s e e e e - g ­ ­ ment had to be persuaded to embrace voice mail. Administration asked the department to conduct a small survey to determine whether there was a need for voice mail. The Reference Department recorded the number of phone que­ ries for a typical week. During a five-day pe­ riod in September 1992 the reference staff handled 492 phone calls. Patron queries con­ cerning library hours and directions accounted for 16.8 percent3 of the total; transferals and referrals constituted 24.5 percent; searching the library’s catalogs for known items made up 40.4 percent; finally, reference questions were 18 percent o f the total number of questions asked. Reference librarians accustomed to respond­ ing to phone queries in real time raised valid concerns about how voice mail might impact the quality o f service and the workload. Refer­ ence librarians were concerned that the phone queries shunted to voice mail would not re­ ceive timely responses. They wanted to know how many times a phone would ring before it went to voice mail and whether a voice mail session could be overridden if a librarian picked up the call after it had entered voice mail. Who would answer voice mail? How often would we respond to the messages? There was some concern over a new reference duty that required additional time, replacing the hurried phone service that took place during the already des­ ignated desk duty. On the positive side, it was hoped that one o f the major benefits of voice mail would be the ability to continue working with patrons in the library with the knowledge that the voice mail system would handle the telephone over­ flow in a satisfactory way. In the past, the line would simply ring until the reference staff an­ P aut Frisch is h e a d of ref eren ce a t the University of Illinois a t Chicago, e-m ail: u58257@uicvm.uic.edu; Jo h n J. Small is electronic resources librarian a t Central Missouri State University, Warrensburg, e-mail: cmsuvmb.cmsu.edu mailto:u58257@uicvm.uic.edu 344 /C&RL News swered it or until the client no longer had th patience to wait. Neither of these options wer viewed as particularly acceptable, because i the line was allowed to ring it may have give the impression that the reference staff were no on duty or were not interested in fielding calls If a busy reference librarian answered the line the phone client was often put on hold for a indeterminate period of time. In addition, whil the client was on hold, all other callers to th reference line heard a busy signal. Many calls received at the Reference Des require forwarding, usually to another librar department. The voice mail account would al low us to leave up to a three-minute greetin message for callers, which we initially planne to use in directing callers to the proper librar department. An automated attendant feature another approach to transferring calls, woul allow callers to select from a menu of librar services and to have their calls forwarded t the appropriate department. As it has turned out, the only option tha we have actually put into effect is the ability t be transferred to a machine that gives the li brary hours. Limited options and simple instruc tions may be the best approach to reachin library patrons. Bruce Flanders, a noted auto mation librarian, points out, “the key to mak ing [new technology] accessible to users is t control your enthusiasm for the technology an to make the system as easy as possible an keep the options limited and the recorde messages brief.”4 Keep the m essage clear and brief In addition to keeping the recorded messag brief, we have learned the importance of re moving ambiguity. We are now on the fourt iteration of the message. For the most part, it i the “standard” answering machine message used by many people and places: “You have reached the Reference Desk a the Main Library of the University of Illinois a Chicago. The reference librarians are unable t answer the phone at this time. Please leave message, including your entire question, you name, phone number and a time you can be reached, or your CMS user ID number if you wish a reply by e-mail. Your message will be answered in the late morning or mid-afternoon, Monday through Friday. Messages received af ter 4 o ’clock will be answered on the follow ing weekday; messages received on Saturda or Sunday will be answered the following Mon e e f n t . , n e e k y ­ g d y , d y o t o ­ ­ g ­ ­ o d d d e ­ h s t t o a r ­ ­ y ­ day. If you want the library hours please press ‘zero.’” The actual phraseology of the message has turned out to be of more than passing impor­ tance. In the first iteration of the message, the phrase “If you want to leave a message” stood in place of “Please leave a message.” As a re­ sult, clients who chose not to leave a message were holding on the line in the apparent belief that someone would eventually pick up the line if they chose not to leave a message. Once the actual wording had been changed (with some additional vocal emphasis on the phrase, “leave a message”), this problem cleared up almost immediately. We also believe it is im­ portant to tell callers when they can expect to have their queries answered in order to reduce user frustration and forestall unrealistic expec­ tations of response time. Handling voice mail reference queries In the first six months, there were a total of 1,995 calls transferred to the voice mail system during regular desk hours when a librarian did not pick up the phone before the fourth ring. Once a call has entered voice mail it cannot be overridden. Callers that transferred to the li­ brary hours recording were not counted for technical reasons, while clients calling the Ref­ erence Desk after hours are automatically trans­ ferred to the hours tape. Hang ups accounted for 876 calls (43.9 percent), and 44 callers (2.2 percent) did not identify themselves. The Ref­ erence Department successfully contacted 907 of the 1,075 callers who identified themselves (84.3 percent). Not surprisingly, 95.5 percent of the identified callers chose phone, rather than electronic mail, as their means of receiving answers to their queries. The 1,075 identified callers left 1,283 queries. Known item searches accounted for 833 queries (64.9 percent), ref­ erence questions numbered 299 (23.3 percent), and referrals totaled 151 (11.7 percent). Voice mail messages are answered Monday through Friday in the late morning and late afternoon. No attempt is made to answer on evenings or weekends because of limited staff­ ing. The department has a voice mail coordi­ nator who assigns voice mail service to our four resident librarians on a rotating basis. It normally takes two to two-and-a-half hours per day to listen to voice mail, find the answers, and respond. This service is counted as public contact hours, and the librarian is accordingly assigned fewer desk hours that day. Ju n e 1 9 9 4 /3 4 5 The department has developed two printed forms for voice mail. The first form is for a daily tally of statistics. The second form is a voice mail log. Each identified call is put on a sepa­ rate log sheet. The information includes caller’s name, phone number or e-mail address, name of the responding librarian, date of listening, and whether a.m. or p.m. The respondent writes down the question, sources consulted, and answer. Finally, the librarian notes whether the response was via phone or electronic mail, the times a phone response was attempted (a maxi­ mum of four attempts spread over a two-day period), further action to be taken or comments, and whether the message was deleted from voice mail after the transaction was completed. Conclusions Voice mail is a developing technology that will allow reference librarians to continue serving the patrons who are physically present, while allowing contact via telephone to continue. As long as the messages are checked often and answered promptly, users are likely to accept the delayed but assured responses of voice mail. In our experience, there have been more com­ ments about how useful the system is, than there have been negatives. While patrons pre­ fer to speak with a living human being, voice mail offers an alternative to the busy signal that should not be overlooked. In fact, some pa­ trons have been identified as “regular callers” to the voice mail system. Voice mail is particu­ larly beneficial to the interactions between ref­ erence staff and in-person clients during the busiest portions of the day. A more thorough reference transaction is likely to occur in an environment not driven by the interruptions of ringing phones. Notes 1. C. H. Nolan, “Voice messaging technology and library applications,” C a n a d ia n L ibrary o u r n a l 49 ( J u n e 1992): 217-20. 2. Bruce Flanders, “Voice mail: Enhancing ommunications,” C om puters in L ibraries 11 (February 1991): 28-29. 3. The Main Library was already operating a recording of the library hours on a separate phone number. 4. Flanders, “Voice mail,” 28-29- ■ J c