Contact centers are, by definition, all about communication. And the richness of the communication has been enhanced immeasurably by the deployment of unified communication and collaboration (UCC) tools with their wide range of features and functionality. That said, firms have not always been able to take full advantage of much needed functionality due to potential compliance concerns which have led some users to switch features off. UC providers are alive to the need from customers and are prioritizing helping by providing more ways to solve recordkeeping and supervision needs - the recent news from Zoom on its approach serves as a positive example on what firms can (and should) expect from their communication and collaboration providers.

Indeed in a recent webinar, Zoom, Theta Lake and PCI Pal explored ‘Navigating Compliance Challenges: Strategies for a Robust Contact Centre’ and highlighted how Zoom is simplifying compliance via a fully integrated suite with Zoom Compliance Manager being powered by Theta Lake.

Zoom Compliance Manager in action:

For financial services firms, contact centers are not only on the front line of communications with customers and potential customers but also need to be (and remain) compliant. In the UK contact centers will need a particular focus on the Consumer Duty and its expectations including the ability to be able to evidence the effectiveness of communications. In the U.S. there are multiple rules including SEC’s electronic recordkeeping requirement Rule 17a-4 updated in 2022. Regulators have also updated their expectations with regard to things like emojis with the clear expectation (as pointed out by Micheal Solomon, head of FINRA’s national examination program at the FINRA conference in May 2023) that firms need to be able to recognise, retain and act on emojis as part of any (written) communication. A specific example cited was that the ‘angry face’ emoji may well need to be considered as a complaint.

For contact centers there are also key considerations for the management and governance of data including non-public personal information and, specifically, credit card and other financial information. It is another aspect of recordkeeping that firms are required to be able to keep records and data secure and unaltered. 

Contact centers need to have recordkeeping as core competency

All aspects of recordkeeping are an expected core competency for financial services firms and for contact centers being a key communications hub it is even more vital. Contact centers are critical in terms of the upstream capture and retention of all relevant records which then allows firms to, downstream, manage their business and evidence compliance. 

Indeed, it is only with a complete, native context, secure but accessible data set can firms begin to not only fulfill all relevant compliance obligations but also to have insightful strategic management information. Recordkeeping and the associated required data governance can only begin with the upstream capture and retention of all relevant records and data points. 

As contact centers move towards more use of video to enrich the customer experience, firms will need to enhance their investment in compliance technology to be able to retain (and oversee) all elements of communications. Going forward that is likely to be not only voice, written communications, video (including screen shares) and emojis but also gifs and reactions. 

How Theta Lake can help

Backed by the investment arms of Cisco, RingCentral, Salesforce, and Zoom, Theta Lake is a recognized leader in Digital Communications Governance and it’s multi-award winning product suite provides patented compliance and security for modern collaboration platforms, utilizing hundreds of frictionless partner integrations including RingCentral, Webex by Cisco, Microsoft 365 and Teams, Slack, Zoom, Movius, Box, Mural, Asana and more. 

Theta Lake empowers organizations to safely, compliantly, and cost-effectively expand their use of unified communication platforms by enabling capture, compliant archives, and acting as an archive connector for existing archives of record across video, voice, and chat collaboration systems. Theta Lake supports Zoom Contact Center, RingCentral's RingCX, RingCentral Contact Center, NICE CXOne and customers benefit from:

• The ability to ensure that all aspects of messaging can be preserved, and a full audit trail provided to supervisors and regulators. For example, chat messages can be viewed in their native format over the entire history of the conversation, with full context retained including images, GIFs, emojis and reactions.
  
  
• Searching instantly across participants, all modes of unified communication and collaboration tools, meshed conversations, and timelines in an easy to navigate search system that covers and provides full replay for voice, video, chat, email, images, emojis, files, whiteboards, and more.
  
  
• Patented AI & ML to detect, surface, and enable actual response for regulatory, privacy, and security risks in an AI assisted review workflow with remediation and patented UCC security control integrations for protection across what is shared, shown, spoken, and typed.
  
  
• Theta Lake’s risk and compliance suite provides an advanced security and privacy architecture named STAR3 (Secure in Transit, Access, in Redaction, Remediation, and Removal), which is  SOC2 Type II certified with ISO 27001 mapping, PCI DSS certified, 17a-4 and audit trail attested, BAA supported, and undergoes regular penetration testing so our customers, partners, and regulators worldwide are confident in That Lake’s data and system security, integrity, and privacy.
  
  

Ways to learn more

• Theta Lake’s Digital Communications Governance, Compliance and Security Report 2023/24 can be downloaded here
  
  
• Visit: ThetaLake.com | LinkedIn | X at @thetalake
  
  
• Join a weekly 30-minute demo webinar here or request a bespoke demo today from the  friendly Theta Lake team here
  
  
• Keep up to date with regulatory perspectives from Theta Lake here