Most of today’s call recording solutions capture both parties in a single mixed mono recording format. Less than ideal, mono recordings offer lower-fidelity audio and make it difficult to discern who said what – especially if the agent and the customer are talking over one another. A far better option today for most businesses is stereo recording (aka dual channel), in which both parties are captured in separate audio channels (think left speaker and right speaker on headphones). The fidelity with dual channel recordings is much higher, making it easier to distinguish which party is speaking.

Beyond fidelity and voice distinction, stereo recording offers a variety of benefits over mono, including:

• Agent performance management – Being able to listen to one person (in the event two parties are speaking over each other) enables managers and supervisors to listen to just the agent for more precise performance training.
• Dispute resolution – In cases of contentious disputes, it can be invaluable to prove precisely who said what during an interaction. This can allow your organization to amicably settle an otherwise costly disagreement with a customer.
• Proven compliance – In order to prove what was or was not said on the call or over Skype For Business, for example, stereo recording enables you to single out your agent’s voice to accurately verify compliance and avoid potential fines. This can be particularly helpful when complying with HIPAA, Truth in Lending Act, etc.

Powering Speech Analytics

Stereo recording serves as the backbone to speech analytics systems. Without separated audio channels, transcriptions will lose accuracy where accuracy is key. With stereo recording, the transcription engine can isolate the customer’s voice and run analytics against that audio stream alone to garner the unique customer intelligence you require. For example, it means a lot more to identify interactions in which a customer used the word “cancel”, versus an agent. With mono recording, this might not be possible, especially if there is over-talk.

If you want to record your Skype for Business and/or other interactions in stereo for either compliance or quality management, and to deliver audio post-call or in real time to an external application (such as speech analytics), contact Numonix to discuss your options and how our solutions will meet your needs.