If your business receives so many calls, emails, and customer communications requests throughout the day that it’s hard to keep track of them all, it might be time to call in some help. But as soon as you start looking for customer service assistance, you’ll be bombarded with advertisements for call centers, answering services, and other forms of communication assistance. So how do you choose? Which will provide the type of services you need?

Though these two sound the same on the surface, they do offer different services, and choosing the right one is important for your customer’s experience when they contact your company.

What Does an Answering Service Do?

At its most basic, an answering service provides a business with a third-party method for answering customer calls, emails, and chats. Answering service agents take messages, and relay them to the appropriate person or department, as specified by the business they serve. An answering service can handle a high volume of calls, and most calls are shorter in duration.

What Does a Call Center Do?

A call center also handles a high volume of calls, but there are more services provided. Call centers provide trained agents that work one-on-one with each caller to solve problems, set appointments, look up orders, and provide solutions to common needs. Through the use of complex scripts, we create personalized experiences for each caller .

At Answer United, callers are always answered by a live member of the answering service staff. Answer United representatives answer our calls promptly and politely.

Responses are always tailored to the situation and the caller’s needs. Calls can be directed to the appropriate department, or issues can be handled by trained staff members without even needing to contact the company.

What Services Can an Answering Service Provide?

Answering services can handle large volumes of calls. They help businesses provide services to ensure that every customer is answered, and their calls are directed to the correct department or staff member.

When a call comes in, the caller is asked several pertinent questions and the key information is noted down. The message is then relayed to the preferred department or staff member via a call, text, email, fax, or message on a secure web portal.

This answering style is helpful for everything from customer inquiries to urgent callers who need to speak with an on-call physician.

What Services Can a Call Center Provide?

Call centers provide a unique set of services that many businesses want to offer their customers but cannot on their own due to limited means in-house. Call centers can provide detailed services such as absentee services, help-desk services, product recalls, and taking orders. No matter how complex the situation, our call center agents can handle these types of situations.

What Services Does Answer United Offer?

Answer United is set up to provide you with the best of both worlds, Answering Services & Call Center Services. We offer customized services for each business we work with, and we’ll work with you one-on-one to help you determine which services are best for your communications needs.

Answer United has nearly six decades providing industry-leading call center solutions and answering services to businesses across the United States. Being based in the United States and staffed with English and bi-lingual speakers, your customers get the benefits of English and Spanish languages.

We offer services including:

–        Live Call Answering
–        Order Taking
–        Help Desk Services
–        Emergency Dispatch
–        Ad Response
–        Email Reading and Response
–        Appointment Scheduling
–        And much more!

At Answer United, we offer the best of both worlds, by providing you with a combination of services. No matter what type of service you need, we can handle it under one roof with professionally trained answering service and call center agents. We handle calls with professionalism and care, so you can be sure your customers are getting the best customer service available.

Now that you know that answering services provide shorter-duration call services and call centers provide longer and more complex call services, do you have an idea of which you might benefit from? The best part about Answer United is that you have both options available to you. You don’t have to pick and choose between a call center or an answering service when Answer United partners with your business to provide customers, clients, and staff with the services you need.