Operational Resilience: Ensuring Availability in Remote Contact Center Work

As a leader in BPO contact center services, our organization stands out among the top contact centers in Mexico. Our experience in remote support and omnichannel customer service strengthened our ability to quickly adopt work-from-home models without compromising service quality—demonstrating why we are a benchmark in the national market.

In early 2020, the world faced one of the most significant challenges of the century: COVID-19. The early experiences in Italy and Spain made it clear that this would pose a high risk to the health of our agents and the continuity of our clients’ operations. This foresight allowed us to take immediate action before the virus spread among our teams and before activity suspensions were officially declared.

We executed a three-phase strategy:

1. We implemented full health protocols at all entrances, contact centers, and offices to ensure zero internal infections. Medical and sanitization teams were doubled.

2. Upon the announcement of Phase 2, we built the technological infrastructure to send over 1,500 agents home, ensuring social distancing and continuity of client services—critical to our BPO contact center operations.

3. We invested in preventive health and maintenance measures to ensure a safe work environment. This included nebulizer technology, hospital-grade UV equipment, intravenous vitamin treatments, and mass rapid testing to prevent outbreaks.

The health of our agents was always our top priority.

In early March, we created a dedicated COVID department and a committee composed of all company directors, meeting every morning to assess the situation and take action. The directive was clear: protect the health of our agents first, and ensure client operations continued—regardless of cost or the need for external authorization.

Initial efforts focused on uninterrupted installation of hand sanitizer dispensers at all access points, free distribution of face masks to agents, and hiring additional medical staff. We also placed disinfectant wipes at all supervisor stations to allow constant cleaning. Knowing that compliance with health protocols would be a challenge requiring full team commitment, we developed a mandatory COVID-19 prevention course on our e-learning platform and reinforced it with ongoing informational campaigns.

As national case numbers rose, we sent all high-risk personnel home with full pay. When the possibility of a red alert was raised, our infrastructure, IT, and development teams quickly mobilized to transition eligible operations to remote work. In the first week, we successfully migrated 200 workstations, showcasing the technological strength of our BPO contact center.

At the same time, we prepared our physical centers to operate under red alert conditions. We increased medical staff (hiring around 50 professionals), adapted facilities to comply with distancing protocols, installed acrylic dividers, rented additional space, deployed hospital-grade UV air purifiers, and used high-powered disinfectants via thermo-nebulization. We also launched a vitamin reinforcement campaign for our management team, administering 53 doses of Glutathione, and offered free influenza vaccinations to all staff.

These actions enabled us, within days, to build a health team of over 50 professionals, establish full sanitary control at all access points, send over 170 vulnerable employees home, and transition more than 1,500 agents to remote work to ensure safe distancing.

By the time the red alert was declared, we were fully prepared—with remote operations in place and safe facilities—positioning our BPO contact center as a national benchmark in operational continuity and resilience during the pandemic.

Project Results:

• COVID-Positive Agents: With the measures implemented, we reduced the infection rate from 0.84% to 0.03%. No positive case was due to internal transmission.

• Suspected COVID Cases: We successfully identified suspected cases in time and reduced the rate from 3.83% to 0.33%, preventing internal spread.

• Connection Efficiency: We achieved a higher efficiency rate in remote operations compared to on-site contact center operations.

• VPH/PHP: This performance indicator increased from 0.16% to 0.61% in remote work.

• Conversion Rate: We doubled customer conversion with agents working from home.

• Attrition: We reduced turnover from 15% to 8% in one year. Thanks to the actions taken, this indicator has been steadily decreasing since 2018.

• NPS: We saw a 2% increase in employee promoters, directly impacting lower attrition and improved agent satisfaction.

Our main contribution to our clients was maintaining operational continuity from the start of the pandemic—migrating eligible operations to remote work within days and keeping on-site centers safe for services that required physical presence. All of this was achieved without impacting productivity or key metrics like absenteeism or turnover. We also maintained full staffing levels and continued to meet new hiring requests at the same pace as before the pandemic.

Our greatest strength has always been the high-level technology we deploy across all projects, combined with our expert teams who were able to operate from anywhere and respond in real time—positioning our BPO contact center as a technologically and operationally advanced organization.

The market clearly valued these benefits. As a result, we onboarded seven new clients in the past year and strengthened relationships with existing ones, expanding several projects.

Having safe facilities also gave our clients confidence when visiting us. By ensuring minimal risk of contagion through our comprehensive safety measures, they felt secure knowing their services were protected and could continue operating with equal or even greater productivity.

Executing this strategy also helped us earn multiple certifications this year, including the Safe Workplace Certification for COVID issued by the federal government. The measures taken for our agents also enabled us to become GPTW-certified for the first time as a great place to work.

Although, like most organizations, we weren’t prepared for a pandemic, we were ready to face a crisis that would accelerate the digital transformation of the industry—with a business continuity plan designed with our clients in mind. This was an innovative project, combining extensive health protocols—exceeding those of many organizations—with a strategic follow-up plan that has allowed us to guarantee the safety of our agents and clients to this day.

Among the key actions we continue to implement—beyond government requirements—are:

▪️ Deep sanitization through a specialized provider across all building areas
▪️ Installation of UV air disinfection systems with surgical-grade technology
▪️ Thermo-nebulization of workspaces
▪️ Periodic oxygen level checks for all staff
▪️ Investment in a disinfectant diffusion system
▪️ Medical personnel stationed at all access points
▪️ Hydration reminders every 15 minutes
▪️Ongoing free Glutathione multivitamin treatments for our management and leadership teams

Overcoming the crisis brought by COVID-19 without losing staff is a remarkable achievement. All companies had to adapt—some with better results than others—and many faced challenges that were difficult to overcome. We can confidently say we were prepared, and during the pandemic, we not only maintained our clients’ services and kept our teams safe, but we also grew and acquired new clients, thanks to our technology that enables secure, reliable, and efficient service continuity both remotely and on-site.

We have specialized teams that responded in real time, with preventive strategies that allowed us to act quickly when the red alert was declared—maintaining agent productivity and even surpassing results previously achieved on-site. Without a doubt, the commitment of every team member made our business continuity plan work, and it’s essential that every part of the organization remains aligned and engaged.