AMETHYST

Introducing Amethyst Call Recorder

Datatex has always believed that constant development and innovation are key to setting us apart from our competitors, keeping us in the forefront and cementing us as the leaders in the telecommunications industry. It is with this vision that we developed AMETHYST, our benchmark voice logger.
 
Compliancy:
 
All our recording cards connecting to external service providers are ICASA approved. AMETHYST can help any company comply with FICA, FAIS and NCA requirements, as we conform to the provisions of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, 2002 No. 25 of 2002. Our locally designed and manufactured USB recording taps also adhere to the requirements for RoHS compliancy. Our web server was developed from scratch alleviating the need for, or possibility of, external exploits, extra patches or 3 rd party software, again ensuring we meet the strictest possible security requirements within best business practices. Requirements for around-the-world-seating of web based supervisors is a reality as there are no extra settings needed on the domain or Active Directories to move or even exchange supervisors.
 
Recording Methods:
 
AMETHYST supports multiple concurrent recording methods to suite the needs and growth of the client. We can record any mixture of ISDN, analogue, proprietary digital and radios at the same. We can record on your lines coming into the PABX, (trunk side). We can record both proprietary digital and analogue extensions behind the PABX (extension side). We can also record at the handset or headset of both digital and analogue phones (client side). Extension and trunk side methods employ a card server with recording abilities. Development of VOIP recording is currently taking place and will be ready before the end of the year. We store on average 160 hours of recording time on every 1gb of disk space giving us close to 30,000 hours of recording time on our smallest recording servers.
Support for Remote Sites and Unlimited Growth:
 
Our modular designed architecture allows for endless growth including remote site recording to a centralized Amethyst server. All remote sites are locally managed and configured via a standard web interface removing the need for expert personnel on site. Call recording data synchronization between remote sites and the local site can be either real-time or scheduled for off-peak times to have no impact on data traffic via the WAN.
 
Defined Security Principles:
 
AMETHYST is a secure black box environment, with various encryption methods used in the system. All recordings taking place are encrypted at source. Only Amethyst software can decrypt our live as well as our archived recordings. These security measures ensure that the recordings on AMETHYST are unusable. Stolen hard drives would be useless as no third party software can decrypt and listen to recordings on them. Decrypted recordings can be exported from the server either by saving them to the local computer or emailing them. Decrypted recordings are tagged with both an MD5 and SHA-256 checksum to comply with Act 25 of 2003. Decrypted recordings can be played by any standard PC media player and are in a standard Wave-GSM610 format. All the original recordings stay on AMETHYST for security and verification purposes. Watermarking can be enabled on the recording cards used by Datatex, as a further method of recording authentication. The advantages of MD5 and SHA-256 are that these methods are industry standards and verification with 3 rd party software can easily be carried out remotely. Therefore a recording can, for instance, be verified in Canada when emailed from South Africa without the need for Amethyst. With Watermarking; the original software (Amethyst) will be required to verify the watermark.
 
System and User Access Management:
 
AMETHYST subscribes wherever feasible to best business practices and therefore only single user accountability on the Administration server is allowed. Supervisor access is customizable per supervisor, granting them access to only certain agents and with certain rights pertaining to their login.
The administration and supervisor functions are fully web based and run from the main Amethyst server. There is no need to install extra supervisor applications on remote computers. Management is done via the web interface and does not require any physical access to the server. Upgrades can be done remotely via web upload, again removing the need for access to the server itself. This central maintenance and accessibility removes the need for a lot of man hours spent updating software. Just one server need be updated to ensure that all the supervisors are up to date when they next log in.
System Health Monitors:
 
AMETHYST is a self-maintainable solution, with little human interaction needed. Notifications via email or SMS are sent if any card server becomes unavailable, (in many cases it is the first notification that there are networking issues at many of our clients’ offices) and any other critical information that is needed for AMETHYST to function correctly. There are also alarm triggers on the cards which warn supervisors if a PRI goes down or cable is pulled out. AMETHYST reports if any required information is unavailable, sends notices about system overload and reports when disk usage is getting low. This is just part of the hassle free operation that AMETHYST has to offer with regards to maintenance, and securing a more productive work environment for the technicians and voice logger. The system does periodic checks to ensure that all hardware is in working condition and all functions are performed as scheduled. Notifications of errors or unprocessed tasks are sent to predefined recipients via email. Critical error warnings are sent via email and/or SMS and certain processes will shut down automatically to protect the database until these errors are rectified, while ensuring minimum IT intervention.
 
Agent Quality Management:
 
Whilst AMETHYST records all calls for specified users it is essential that the client ensures that the quality of telephonic transactions conducted are of the highest quality. The only way to ensure and measure the quality of transactions over the telephone is to implement agent quality management. The AMETHYST voice recorder comes standard with an industry leading, user-defined Agent Quality Management (AQM) module. The AQM permits defined sampled recordings to be reviewed in conjunction with a ‘scoring and review’ process by the supervisor or QA Management. To compliment Agent Quality Management (AQM), voice recordings are stored with screen shots of actual transactions on the workstation (data capturing) associated with the voice recording. This empowers the agent to comply with pre-defined business processes and provides an accurate record for Agent Quality Management. Years of research and working hand in hand with call centre and quality assurance managers has made our reports some of the most powerful in the industry. Easily customizable and configurable templates are available to suite the supervisors’ or Quality Assessors’ needs. With a large number of conclusive reports this is an important tool for identifying areas for improvement and training requirements in the business. Agent Quality Management is not just nice to have, but rather a critical business management tool. Companies that are not yet measuring or managing the quality of all communication with their customers are losing ground to the opposition. For those that have set up monitoring facilities, it is essential to ensure that call recording with AQM plays a vital part in their future roadmap, because in the end, the business will go to those companies that can supply consistently, measurably, high quality customer service to their clients.
Archiving Processes:
 
There are various archiving methods available with AMETHYST – removable local drive, NFS, or both methods simultaneously. These methods were put in place due to their practicality and cost efficiency. They have proven on numerous occasions to be more efficient and reliable than any other backup solutions. At Datatex we encourage and embrace practices which have been proven in real business solutions that work, coupled with the duration of data integrity on hard drives, make these options the perfect solution for any company’s archiving needs. No calls will be purged from the live system unless we have guaranteed a successful archive of the recording. Amethyst constantly monitors archiving media and the network, and handles failures to ensure reliable archiving of data at all times. If the media archive is filling up, an advance notice will be sent to the system administrator.
 
Integration into 3 rd Party Software:
 
AMETHYST can integrate via daily CSV reports on all recordings processed, Aim’s done and COM objects. Datatex do provide sample source code and will assist developers with integration queries at no cost incurred to the client. Integration with Microsoft Outlook is a standard option. Each recording is stored as a Microsoft Outlook journal on the individual agent’s workstation. A direct URL to the recording gives end-users the opportunity to listen to their own recordings without logging into the AMETHYST supervisor. Integration into other third-party applications is supported via the AMTlink (Com Object) application which is a standard AMETHYST feature. CTI must be enabled for third-party integration on trunk-side recording solutions.
 
Redundancy and Support:
 
Installation, training and support are included in new installations for the 1 st year within predefined parameters. Datatex also offers a full hosted or onsite redundancy solution with AMETHYST ensuring zero down time during any unforeseen failure under additional SLAs. Spare parts including recording cards and servers are readily available. Our help desk support is free of charge and available to all our users. We can also provide guaranteed standby equipment, hosted redundancy, live monitoring and support, preventative maintenance and 24x7x365 support under additional SLA levels.
 
Positioning:
 
If you are looking for a call recorder that meet the needs of some of the top companies in South Africa then you have just found it. You will not find a higher quality recorder for more money.