Cisco Agent Desktop Question

[rgomez]

Version 6.1.33 for CAD

Is there a way to hide or disable the status icon on the CAD when a supervisor is recording an agent. We would like it so that the agents are not aware that they are being recorded.

[smalkeric]

The Toolbar tab enables you to:

Show or hide buttons on the Agent Desktop toolbar

Associate actions with task buttons

Change task button hints

Customize icons

There is a button for the 'Reports' , you can uncheck the 'visible' property for this. It should disappear from the desktop toolbar, try it out . May need to restart the CAD after the change

[rgomez]

it is not the icons we are trying to hide, but the notification on the Status bar. For example, when a call comes to an agent, the status bar appear with a little telephone, when that call is answered the little telephone changes it state. When an agent is being recorded this icon (in the status bar) changes and actually allows the agent to know they are being recorded. We have the pop up message disabled, but it is the icon in the status bar that is the problem. I can try to post a screen shot if neccessary. Thanks

[jarmitage]

Although I don't have a solution for hiding the recording notification, I thought you should be aware of some issues this will bring in to your work environment. I just don't want you to get bitten by a disgruntled employee who knows about the new privacy laws here in Canada -- surreptitious monitoring is the most tricky area in privacy law for employers.

Since you have divisions in Western, Central and Eastern Canada, you're going to fall under a number of different privacy laws and acts. BC and Alberta both have PIPA, which supersedes PIPEDA (although PIPEDA is applicable in most other provinces and territories, other than Quebec which also has its own provincial act). There's also Federal law (e.g.:Criminal Code of Canada) to deal with, although most of the latest developments are occurring at a provincial level.

You should probably touch base with your in-house or external legal counsel, however here are some really good resources on this topic, all focused on Canadian privacy law:

Can you record telephone calls without consent?

http://www.privacylawyer.ca/blog/2006/07/can-you-record-telephone-calls-without.html

Privacy in the Workplace

http://www.privcom.gc.ca/fs-fi/02_05_d_17_e.asp

Workplace Monitoring and Surveillance (pdf download)

http://www.mccarthy.ca/pubs/Monitoring_and_Surveillance.pdf

The gist of the situation is this: as long as you notify your employees on an ongoing basis (we incorporated it into a click-through notice that's displayed every login), and have them sign off acknowledging your policy, you should be ok.

I hope that helps, this is an emerging area in Canadian law and it's still open to interpretation.

Regards,

-James.

Note: I am not a lawyer, and this isn't legal advice. Talk to a real lawyer before acting on any of the above.

[rgomez]

James, thanks for this info, very helpful. I would be interested in knowing/learning more about the click-through notice you talked about.

Thanks,

Steve

[jarmitage]

Hi Steve,

Whenever an agent logs into a workstation, we've got a script that automatically opens Internet Explorer and defaults the browser homepage to our employee privacy notice page. (This is locked down, and cannot be changed.)

Unless the agent clicks the "I accept" link, they can't use other portions of our intranet (knowledge base, etc).

We also have all new hires sign off on a "Policy & Procedures" document that includes notice that they may be monitored without advance notice. If you're just implementing this procedure, you may want to distribute a notice and have existing staff sign off on it as well.

Basically, if you can get your staff to sign off on a document as well as have them acknowledge the policy daily, then it should be enough to head off any claims of invasion of privacy.

Generally, if you'll also be capturing any customer information while monitoring your agents, it's also considered a best practice to have a recording along the lines of "this call may be monitored for quality control purposes" (or something similar).

Although the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that capturing customer data while monitoring an agent is incidental to the purpose of the recording (and therefore not a breach of customer privacy) that could easily change.

One of the most difficult parts around all of this is that most of the legislation is built around "reasonable" limits, and the courts keep moving the definition of "reasonable" around. Thankfully, it seems that the overall trend is towards the rights of the employer, rather than carte blanche protection for employees.

Hope that helps a little, let me know if you have any other questions.

Cheers,

-James.

Please rate helpful posts...

[rgomez]

Great info. We do have the "you call maybe recorded ......." message playing at the beginning of every queue a customer may enter.

The sign off seems to me the most important part. I will look into this further for our company. Thanks.

I just wish I could find the answer to the icon status LOL

Thanks

Steve

[jarmitage]

Hi Steve,

Just wondering, what specific function are you using to monitor your agents? If you're using the "Silent Monitoring" feature, then I'm not sure why any icon would display at all...

"Silent monitoring means that voice packets sent to and received by the agent's IP hard phone are captured from the network and sent to the supervisor desktop. At the supervisor desktop, these voice packets are decoded and played on the supervisor's system sound card."

Cisco IP Contact Center Enterprise Edition Releases 5.0 and 6.0 Solution Reference Network Design (SRND)

http://www.ciscosystems.com/en/US/docs/voice_ip_comm/cust_contact/contact_center/ipcc_enterprise/srnd/5x_6x/c5desktp.html

And then from here:

"VoIP monitoring is invisible to the persons on the phone. Agents on calls are

not aware that they are being monitored or recorded unless the Notification fea-

ture has been enabled from within Cisco Desktop Administrator."

Voice-Over IP Monitoring Best Practices Deployment Guide for CAD 6.0/6.1 [pdf download]

http://www.cisco.com/application/pdf/en/us/guest/products/ps427/c1225/ccmigration_09186a008038a48d.pdf

Although the documentation mentions that some NICs are incompatible with this feature, it almost sounds like you're using some other feature in the Supervisor Desktop... Silent Monitoring is essentially a packet capture of selected RTP packets (filtered for the agent you want to monitor).

Cheers,

-James.

[jarmitage]

Sorry to reply to my own post, but here are two more docs you might want to skim through:

Configure and Deploy Silent Monitoring and Record in CRS

http://cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/voicesw/ps556/products_tech_note09186a00801a62a8.shtml

Silent Monitoring and Recording Using Unified Communications Manager

http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/systems/unified/uc601/feapps/cmmonrec.htm

Hope that helps!

-j.

[regi_firnanda]

In the Cisco Desktop Administrator application, in the left window pane, if you highlight/select the "Desktop Configuration" node, a "Monitoring" toolbar tab will show up on top (alongside File, View, Window, Help). If you click it, two sub menus : Notify Monitoring and Notify Recording will show up. You can click to Un-Checked them.

[rgomez]

I have tried the Desktop Administrator monitor menu. See the attached screen shot.

After doing further research, this icon appears when the recording of an agent is scheduled in the Desktop Administrator program.

If my supervisor clicks to record any agent from the Supervisor Desktop, the agent is not notified.

However our supervisors request that we schedule our agents (ie: the night before, they request we setup agent A, B to be recorded the next day).

I was wondering if there was a way to modify that icon, where is it stored? Wondering if we could replace that icon with the dot to just the telephone icon (that looks the same)

Thanks