Ingram is now offering 24-hour customer service, seven days a week. The Customer Care desk can take orders, check stock, track packages and offer support for electronic orders. Previously, Ingram's service was limited to the hours of 7 a.m.—7 p.m. Monday—Friday; 9 a.m.—5 p.m. on Saturday; and noon—5 p.m. on Sunday. The expanded hours will especially benefit international customers and those on the West Coast.
Steve Pate, v-p of sales operations, told PW the change did not require extra staff, which currently numbers just under 100, but was enabled by "shifting non-phone-related workload to the evening hours." He added, "Our Internet service—ipage—has been up for several years already, and it does offer 24-hour service. While many of our customers have migrated toward using the Web, there are still those who like to phone and chat. We respect that, and don't want customers to ever have to worry about what time it is they want to do business."
In other Ingram news, the company has added J.A. Majors, the health sciences and technical wholesaler, to its OneSource program. This allows Ingram customers to access and order Majors's 54,000 titles through Ingram's Internet site, ipage, much the way Alibris listings are available through OneSource.
