Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam

We spoke with Maria Korteweg and Ilona Heeres – van Kranenburg, both consultants at the Advice and Management of Educational Systems (ABO) department. ABO plays a crucial role in managing centrally administered educational systems and supporting educational processes across the university.

The Challenge

Since 2009, EUR has worked with TriniCo, previously known as Trinicom, Kana Express, and Verint Express. The collaboration was initiated to efficiently handle student inquiries at the front desk and offer alternative communication channels such as email and web forms.

Students can now reach out through these channels to ask questions. In 2021, WhatsApp was added as a new communication channel. However, this channel operated in a separate application, which led to two main issues:

1. The TriniCo knowledge base couldn’t be used directly to respond to WhatsApp messages, resulting in inefficient workflows like copying, retyping, or recreating answers.
2. 
   Duplicate questions from the same student across different channels made it difficult for staff to maintain oversight and avoid inconsistent responses.

WhatsApp as a Popular Communication Channel

The Front Office frequently uses phone calls, web contact forms, and in-person desk interactions. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, physical desk contact has decreased—now available only three days a week instead of five. WhatsApp has become a valuable alternative, offering students a low-threshold and increasingly popular way to get in touch.

Further Development

Because agents support both Dutch and international students, it was often difficult to determine the language of a WhatsApp message. This made it challenging to select the correct version of the knowledge base. Switching between language versions was also not user-friendly.

Thanks to further development, agents can now automatically switch languages in the knowledge base when responding to WhatsApp messages, ensuring accurate and efficient replies.

Currently, EUR is working on a new feature to gather more information from students who contact them via WhatsApp but are not yet registered in the system. An automated question flow helps quickly build a student profile without agent intervention. Questions like “What is your student number?” or “What are your details?” automatically create a customer card in the system. This gives agents more context, reduces unnecessary questions, and shortens wait times.

Collaboration

Maria and Ilona emphasize that since Harbers Solutions took over the software, there has been plenty of room to share ideas and requests. A strong partnership has developed, with mutual input leading to practical solutions in using TriniCo. Most of the requested features have already been developed or are on the roadmap.

Ilona Heeres emphasizes the importance of the collaboration: “Working with Harbers Solutions on TriniCo has helped both EUR and TriniCo develop a better product. Thanks to the integration, our agents work more efficiently and can provide consistent information.”

Maria Korteweg adds: “The short lines of communication and collaborative approach allow us to align effectively between EUR and Harbers. This enables us to respond quickly to the needs of our students and staff. We’re very satisfied with the results so far and excited about future developments.”