The Highest Quality Telephone Answering Service in the United States

Centratel

Telephone Answering Service

veterinary answering service

Elevating Veterinary Practice Operations with Centratel’s Answering Service: The Key Advantages

October 2, 2023
Veterinary
By Centratel

Navigating the intricate and demanding sphere of veterinary practice requires more than medical proficiency. It entails a seamless blend of client relations, operational efficiency, and timely responsiveness to emergencies. Central to this dynamic is the role of robust communication, ensuring that every call, every query, and every emergency gets addressed with the urgency and empathy it deserves. Enter Centratel’s Veterinary Answering Service, your dedicated ally in fortifying the very backbone of your veterinary practice.

Veterinary Emergencies: Bridging the Critical Moments

Traumatic Injuries: From Mishaps to Medical Assistance

Whether it’s a canine involved in an accident or a feline with sudden distress, traumatic injuries in animals are heart-wrenching events for pet owners. Each moment counts, with the next step potentially making the difference between life and rehabilitation or dire consequences.

Centratel’s Answer: Our 24/7 Live Veterinary Answering Service guarantees immediate relay of such critical situations to your clinic, ensuring that your team is prepped and ready to handle the incoming emergency, be it orthopedics, radiology, or intensive care.

Cardiovascular Emergencies: Time-sensitive and Tender

The delicacy of handling cases like exacerbated heart conditions in equine or avian species can’t be stressed enough. Rapid intervention is key, making the difference between stabilization and a downturn.

Centratel’s Commitment: Through our meticulous call handling process, cardiovascular emergencies are flagged with utmost priority, alerting your cardiology team promptly.

Digestive Emergencies: Gut Reactions to Gastroenterology Crises

From blockages in bovines to gastro distress in exotics, digestive emergencies can be debilitating and alarming. Time plays a vital role in diagnosis, relief, and recovery.

Centratel’s Approach: Leveraging our expert answering service, clinics are swiftly notified, paving the way for timely gastroenterology interventions.

Tackling the Unique Challenges of Veterinary Practice

Operational Challenges: Smoothing the Ruffles

From equipment malfunctions to inventory discrepancies, operational hiccups can distract from the primary goal: animal care. Smooth operations form the heart of an efficient clinic.

Centratel’s Difference: By managing after-hour calls regarding supplies, deliveries, or emergencies, we facilitate seamless operations, letting you focus on preventative medicine, surgery, or nutrition counseling without disturbances.

Staffing Challenges: A Harmonious Healing Environment

The right personnel, from reception to surgery, contribute to a clinic’s success. Handling leaves, shifts, and sudden vacancies can be daunting.

Centratel’s Contribution: Our service assists in prompt communication regarding shift changes or emergencies, ensuring that areas like rehabilitation, dermatology, or laboratory services are always manned by adept professionals.

Client Relations: Building Trust, One Call at a Time

Establishing rapport, addressing concerns, and reassuring anxious pet owners is foundational. Communication can make or break client relations.

Centratel’s Assurance: Be it queries about vaccination, microchipping, or behavior counseling, our answering service stands as the first line of compassionate communication, echoing your clinic’s ethos and dedication.

Dive Deeper with Centratel

For those aspiring to elevate their veterinary practice’s responsiveness and client relations, exploring Centratel’s Veterinary Answering Service is invaluable. The detailed insights and offerings encapsulate our commitment to the veterinary community. For clinics aiming to tailor our services further, we invite you to the Price Quote page, ensuring a solution molded to your unique needs.

In the vast landscape of veterinary medicine, from exotic animals to equine specialties, the resonance of trust, efficiency, and compassion is pivotal. Centratel, with its bespoke answering services, is committed to amplifying this resonance, championing the cause of veterinary practices, and standing as a sentinel of seamless communication.

Image by Freepik

A Telephone Answering Service Representative taking calls at Centratel

Centratel is an elite national telephone answering service located in Bend, Oregon. Centratel’s Veterinary Answering Service assists hundreds of veterinary businesses during and after-hours, throughout the United States and is, by a variety of statistics, the highest quality answering service available among the approximately 800 services nationwide.

Taking the Next Step

For more specifics on cost, to start the onboarding process, or to just talk to us, fill out this form with your basic information and if it’s during regular working hours (M-F 8am to 8pm EST or 5am to 5pm PST), we’ll get back to you within minutes. Or, during the above hours, you can simply call us at 800-664-7159 or send us an email to inquiry@centratel.com.

(And note: for a quick orientation on how we operate, take a moment to review one or more of the key points listed below.)

For more specifics on cost, to start the onboarding process, or to just talk to us, fill out this form with your basic information and if it’s during regular working hours (M-F 8am to 8pm EST or 5am to 5pm PST), we’ll get back to you within minutes. Or, during the above hours, you can simply call us at 800-664-7159 or send us an email to inquiry@centratel.com.

(And note: for a quick orientation on how we operate, take a moment to review one or more of the key points listed on the right.)

Terms of Service

Why Choose Centratel

BY SAM CARPENTER
September 1, 2024

1.CENTRATEL’S UNIQUE 30-DAY FREE TRIAL

Why is this important? Because it will provide you a truly accurate estimate of cost (we bill monthly), it will demonstrate our quality, and it gives both sides of this equation—you and Centratel—the necessary time to refine and perfect operational details.

Here’s a testimonial from a new medical client that had just finished their 30-day trial: “Of course, I love the cost as it is close to the amount I was allowed by the president of the company. I told him that if we did not continue with Centratel, I would resign as the Director of Customer Service, and I meant it. It’s a great fit. We have had NOT ONE complaint from a patient or in-house which, as you know, we received daily with our former answering service. I love you, Centratel, and the price. I’m ready to sign whatever documents you require. Thanks for the great service, and the free month! To a great partnership! -KB, Phoenix“

2.STATISTICALLY, THE BEST IN THE U.S.?

Answering service quality is 100% dependent on human action and reaction, and in the course of a single day a multitude of human decisions are made by the people who process the calls: Telephone Service Representatives, or TSRs. (Some answering services refer to them as “agents.” Others, “operators.”)

Like any other answering service, at Centratel we’re dealing with real live human beings and so human errors occur. But within this labor intensive service industry that is historically known for marginal quality, Centratel’s error rate is light years ahead of established standards. Our most recent Customer Reported Error Rate (April through June, 2024) was 1 customer-reported error for every 6,491 message transactions processed. That statistic is unmatched.

There’s no artificial intelligence manipulation, we do not offshore calls, and we were founded and have always operated within the United States. (Note that since early 2020, the COVID six-foot social distancing mandate drove thousands of small-to-medium sized answering services out of business. Large, foreign-owned multi-nationals, often disguised by the name of the local answering services they acquired, now thoroughly dominate the industry. Hence, an even further decline in general service quality. See this analysis.)

3.CUSTOMER SERVICE EXTRAORDINAIRE

Your concerns and requests will be instantly acted upon. It’s a work ethic that stands out in stark contrast from the general quality decline in human-to-human business-customer communications. You’ve seen it yourself, all around. At Centratel you will know the customer service people you’re working with by name, appreciating their special listening abilities as well as their take-action-now comportments i.e. see the testimonial in point #1 above. ‘Nuff said!

4.GETTING STARTED: IT’S SIMPLE AND FAST

Getting your new Centratel answering service 30-day free trial started is accomplished within 24-48 hours. From the start, your “onboarding” customer service representative will be with you every step of the way, listening carefully to your concerns, answering questions, and offering suggestions.

5.NEW TO USING AN ANSWERING SERVICE?

A majority of our current answering service accounts switched to us from another service because of quality problems. However, if you have not used a service before, you are not familiar with the options, benefits, and pitfalls. As noted, our 30-day free trial provides you—and us—plenty of time to precisely refine your desired message-taking and delivery protocols; to get things exactly the way you want them to be without any financial risk, undue pressure, or obligation. 

6.PRICING

Starting at $89 per month, our rates rank in the mid-range of the industry. For call processing, we charge by the “transaction unit” rather than the duration of time spent handling calls. The three “mega-services” in operation in the U.S. prefer time billing because it ensures the company is compensated for lower-paid/high-turnover —and thus slower— agents. In any answering service, it takes a long time for a new agent to become fast, efficient, and stable. At Centratel, we have always sought to retain experienced agents (via higher pay and great benefits) and, therefore, engender low staff turnover. Needless to say, experienced agents make fewer errors than trainees who learn on-the-job.

7.ACCURATELY COMPARING ANSWERING SERVICE PRICING IS COMPLICATED

It’s apples and oranges. There isn’t an industry standard for billing, and each answering service has its own formula. Also, as noted above, some services charge by “time” while others charge by “work units.” Others combine the two. At Centratel, we charge for the work we do, not by the time we spend. The raw truth is that the only reliable way to determine monthly cost for a new service is to use that service for a solid month. Most answering services offer a 7-day free trial or no trial at all.

8.BEWARE: MONTHLY OR 28-DAY BILLING?

Important! At Centratel, we use a “monthly” billing cycle in which invoices are compiled from the first day of a month to the last day of that month. When soliciting quotes from other services, be sure to ask if the base-rate charges are billed monthly or on a “28-day billing cycle.” There is no good reason for a 28-day billing cycle! It’s bait-and-switch: customers billed on a 28-day cycle actually receive thirteen billings per year and therefore the overall cost is higher.

9.NO CONTRACT AND SIMPLE TERMS OF SERVICE

We do not require a yearly contract for service because we believe you should have the opportunity to evaluate us real-time, without restraint. Our terms of service are simple and straight-forward.

10.VALUABLE FREE GIFT FOR CONTACTING US

If you take the time to discuss answering service with us, on the same day we will ship you a hardcover copy of Sam Carpenter’s bestselling book, Work The System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less, now in its 4th edition…but soon to be released in a 5th edition (August 2024). We’ll send you a copy of this 5th edition, too, when it’s released. (Sam is the founder and President of Centratel. December 1st 2024 marks his fortieth year of ownership.)