The study by audio branding specialist PH Media Group, which surveyed 3,600 UK firms, including more than 100 printing businesses, found that printers put customers on hold for an average of 33.5s per call, 4s longer than the UK average. Implications for profitability were “grave”, said sales and marketing director Mark Williamson. Half of callers hung up within 20s if forced to listen to silence while on hold, he added, referring to similar studies in the US. “These results represent a significant challenge for the printing industry and could pose a threat to profitability,” he said. “Callers are simply unwilling to wait on the end of the line while subjected to silence, ‘muzak’ or beeps. “So firms are putting themselves at serious risk of losing business. Good call-handling is often overlooked as a key sales and marketing tool, but the telephone still acts as an important touchpoint and first impressions count.” Williamson said improving customers’ experience over the phone would drive service standards “through the roof”. Yet of all callers placed on hold, 34% were subjected to silence, 26% to music, while another 26% heard beeps. As part of the study, PH Media Group also audited each company that took part in the study, giving them a score out of 100 based on overall call-handling practice. Printers averaged just 34, after the pollster weighted various aspects to reflect their importance. These aspects included time taken to answer a call, the number of tiers callers face before reaching their target, use of consistent voice and music, and professional and personalised voicemail and out-of-hours messaging. “Good customer service is paramount so it is important to evaluate all aspects of call-handling,” he said. “Inevitably not every call will be answered within a matter of seconds. “So when callers do need to be placed on hold for any length of time, informative and entertaining audio messages can help to maintain their attention and decrease perceived waiting time.” Greenhouse Graphics managing director Ian Crossley, who recently took up a £100-a-month on-hold marketing service from PH Media Group, did not take part in the survey but said the findings did not surprise him. “We don’t have any way of measuring the service’s impact. But for us it’s not so much sales promotion but educating existing and new customers that we are more than just a conventional printer and do other work such as wide-format print.” The survey involved just over 100 printers from an overall sample of 3,600 firms across sectors. Signmakers were worst, leaving callers on the line for 72.6s on average, garden centres were fared best, logging an average time of just 17.4s....

The study by audio branding specialist PH Media Group, which surveyed 3,600 UK firms, including more than 100 printing businesses, found that printers put customers on hold for an average of 33.5s per call, 4s longer than the UK average. Implications for profitability were “grave”, said sales and marketing director Mark Williamson. Half of callers hung up within 20s if forced to listen to silence while on hold, he added, referring to similar studies in the US. “These results represent a significant challenge for the printing industry and could pose a threat to profitability,” he said. “Callers are simply unwilling to wait on the end of the line while subjected to silence, ‘muzak’ or beeps. “So firms are putting themselves at serious risk of losing business. Good call-handling is often overlooked as a key sales and marketing tool, but the telephone still acts as an important touchpoint and first impressions count.” Williamson said improving customers’ experience over the phone would drive service standards “through the roof”. Yet of all callers placed on hold, 34% were subjected to silence, 26% to music, while another 26% heard beeps. As part of the study, PH Media Group also audited each company that took part in the study, giving them a score out of 100 based on overall call-handling practice. Printers averaged just 34, after the pollster weighted various aspects to reflect their importance. These aspects included time taken to answer a call, the number of tiers callers face before reaching their target, use of consistent voice and music, and professional and personalised voicemail and out-of-hours messaging. “Good customer service is paramount so it is important to evaluate all aspects of call-handling,” he said. “Inevitably not every call will be answered within a matter of seconds. “So when callers do need to be placed on hold for any length of time, informative and entertaining audio messages can help to maintain their attention and decrease perceived waiting time.” Greenhouse Graphics managing director Ian Crossley, who recently took up a £100-a-month on-hold marketing service from PH Media Group, did not take part in the survey but said the findings did not surprise him. “We don’t have any way of measuring the service’s impact. But for us it’s not so much sales promotion but educating existing and new customers that we are more than just a conventional printer and do other work such as wide-format print.” The survey involved just over 100 printers from an overall sample of 3,600 firms across sectors. Signmakers were worst, leaving callers on the line for 72.6s on average, garden centres were fared best, logging an average time of just 17.4s....

The Coulsdon, Surrey-based operation, which is the UK inplant of the imaging and electronics giant, purchased the Renz AP 360 automatic punch and Renz MOBI 360 semi-automatic wire-binder. Production manager Alec Bennett said: “The punch is so mechanical and there are no circuit boards or software to go wrong, while the wire-binder is as well built and robust as the punch.” He said the AP 360 punching machine had removed all punching bottlenecks for wire binding, saving labour time and money. Before buying the kit, the 50-staff company used smaller bits of equipment for punching around 20 pieces of paper at a time. “The additional purchase of a four-hole punching die for the machine has led to considerable savings from pre-punching sheets for loose-leaf binders without the need to drill,” said Bennett. The MOBI 360 semi-automatic wire-binder meanwhile enabled the business to replace six temporary workers, who used to tackle predominantly A6 work by hand. Now only one person was needed to operate a machine that binds two at a time to double outputs over a given time. “We have bought lots of kit in the past year, having gone from 12m to 15m images a year and all of that goes through the finishing department,” he said. “The kit will pay for itself; the MOBI 360 has already made significant savings on labour costs. “Both machines are portable, single-phase, have very easy and fast makereadies and require no air. The Renz installation and the training on both machines went smoothly and we are pleased with the savings.”...

The Coulsdon, Surrey-based operation, which is the UK inplant of the imaging and electronics giant, purchased the Renz AP 360 automatic punch and Renz MOBI 360 semi-automatic wire-binder. Production manager Alec Bennett said: “The punch is so mechanical and there are no circuit boards or software to go wrong, while the wire-binder is as well built and robust as the punch.” He said the AP 360 punching machine had removed all punching bottlenecks for wire binding, saving labour time and money. Before buying the kit, the 50-staff company used smaller bits of equipment for punching around 20 pieces of paper at a time. “The additional purchase of a four-hole punching die for the machine has led to considerable savings from pre-punching sheets for loose-leaf binders without the need to drill,” said Bennett. The MOBI 360 semi-automatic wire-binder meanwhile enabled the business to replace six temporary workers, who used to tackle predominantly A6 work by hand. Now only one person was needed to operate a machine that binds two at a time to double outputs over a given time. “We have bought lots of kit in the past year, having gone from 12m to 15m images a year and all of that goes through the finishing department,” he said. “The kit will pay for itself; the MOBI 360 has already made significant savings on labour costs. “Both machines are portable, single-phase, have very easy and fast makereadies and require no air. The Renz installation and the training on both machines went smoothly and we are pleased with the savings.”...

The company said that the new distribution deal would help it deliver a “notable improvement” in customer service and allow it to place greater focus on the development of its products. Drytac Europe managing director Hayden Kelley said: “We believe that this partnership will hugely benefit our customer base. Antalis is an extremely well established business with excellent and far-reaching distribution channels. “Customer support levels in the UK and Ireland will be boosted and Drytac can now fully focus its resources on what it does best – namely the manufacturing of quality adhesives and over-laminates.” “Antalis has many of the best account reps in the business and they will be able to provide excellent advice to our customers regarding the right products for the right applications. They will then be able to supply the Drytac products at the right price and deliver them right on time,” he added. The deal is effective immediately and the company confirmed that current prices would not be affected....