Department Spotlight: Call Center

“Behind the Scenes Heroes”

During a storm, things like broken power poles, power lines on fire, and blown transformers seem to capture the attention of most, but behind all the “action” is a team of call center representatives answering phone calls, entering outages, and communicating with the dispatch control center. Whether the time is 2:00 p.m. or 2:00 a.m., call center employees are waiting and eager to assist VEC members.

“Our main goal in the call center is to assist VEC members in the best way possible,” said VEC Call Center Supervisor Cortney Henry.

The call center, made up of 10 representatives and one supervisor, answers an average of 700 calls in a typical day and around 2,000 calls on a day of a storm. Henry, a former call center representative herself, says the highest volume of calls they have received during her time serving in the supervisory role, was during the March 3 storm that brought wind speeds up to 70 mph and left over 24,000 VEC members without power. From March 3 to March 5, the call center answered 2,780 calls.

“The call center had eight representatives stay past regular business hours the night of March 3, something that is rare. Typically during an overnight outage, two or three representatives staying is normal, but having eight on duty during the night rarely happens.”

Call center representatives are the ones members speak with first and are the calming voices in the midst of calamity. “Thank you” to these behind-the-scenes heroes, who continually choose to “answer the call” for their community.