A natural voice to guide UCPA vacation-goers.

Acapela was chosen as a technological partner over a year ago, when UCPA decided to completely redesign its telephone service. This project, directed by the specialized IT company eWay, allowed UCPA to refresh this important service while gaining on cost and efficiency, and offering an exceptionally clear and natural voice to its users.

A key service for vacation organization.
Three days before the beginning of their vacation, UCPA customers connect, via Internet or the IVR, using their personal code, to obtain all the important information for their journey: timetables, meeting places, etc. The IVR gets as many connections as the website, but before it was redesiged, the information was only updated twice a year, due to the complexity of the updating procedure. Recording the voice prompts used to require two weeks work for several companies: a recording studio, voice talent, development specialists, etc.

In 2002, UCPA decided to take on eWay to fully redesign the service. As a specialist in designing and hosting on-line multimedia services using Internet, Audiotel, Voice XML, etc. eWay chose to replace the old system with a speech synthesis solution, and for this, they chose Acapela. Jean-Marc Geoffroy, speech technology project director at eWay says: "We chose Acapela for its adaptability and especially for its quality, unique on the market."

Indeed, it is difficult to imagine that the warm welcoming voice that guides the visitors is synthetic, the product of Acapela's latest technological research. Using this synthesis, integrated in eWay's voice server Evox, the whole service was redeployed in less than 2 months. As for the updates, the process is now fast and simple: UCPA's text files are instantly translated into "speech files", and are reinserted into the voice server by eWay.

The benefits for UCPA are considerable: fewer companies involved, less hassle, lower costs and maximum efficiency for a high quality service. "Thanks to Acapela TTS, we now know that we can update the messages on the server in real time. This reactivity, combined with the quality of the voice, enhances the young and dynamic image of UCPA. Today, we are definitely very positive about the use of TTS, it has become a key part of our customer relations." Says Frédéric Doillon, project director for UCPA.

For more information : http://www.eway.fr and http://www.ucpa.com