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RFP Package · Enterprise Applications

Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) RFP questions and template

133 questions, 10 demo scenarios and a five-vendor scorecard for choosing Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) software, in one Excel workbook.

Buy the workbook, from $499Read sample questions

What this package is for

Use it to run a Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) software selection, from the first long list to the final scorecard.

What the category covers. Software that runs a contact center: routing and IVR, AI self-service, voice and digital channels, the agent desktop, outbound dialing, supervision, workforce engagement, recording, reporting, CRM integration and telephony. Bought by customer service, sales and support operations replacing an on-premises or older cloud contact center, or adding AI self-service and workforce tools to one.

A selection usually runs in three rounds. The package has questions for each:

  • RFI, to the long list. 29 questions screen out products that lack something you need.
  • RFP, to the shortlist. 68 questions ask how each product does the work.
  • Deep dive, to the finalists. 36 questions ask for proof on your own data.

10 demo scenarios tell each vendor what to load and what to show, so every product does the same work in front of you. 90 due-diligence questions cover security, integration, implementation and exit. The scorecard weights the answers and ranks up to five vendors.

Each question comes with why it matters, what a good answer looks like and the red flags, so the people scoring the replies know what to look for.

3 questions from the package

From the RFI round. The first shows part of the guide each question carries; the workbook adds follow-ups, how to verify the answer, a priority and a weight.

1. Describe how business-hours and holiday calendars are assigned per queue, including how each calendar's time zone is set.

Why it matters. If calendars cannot be set per queue and per time zone, queues that serve different regions open or close at the wrong times, and callers reach empty queues on holidays.

Good answer
  • Each queue can have its own calendar, and one calendar can be reused across several queues.
  • Each calendar has its own time zone, and daylight saving changes are applied automatically.
  • Holidays support partial-day hours and recurring dates.
Red flags
  • One calendar applies to the whole tenant.
  • Holidays must be re-entered every year for each queue.
  • Each holiday requires editing and republishing a flow.

2. Describe how a non-developer builds an IVR menu in your visual flow designer that sends callers to different queues based on their keypad input.

Why it matters. If menu changes need a developer or a vendor services ticket, routine changes such as new options or reworded menus wait on release cycles. Callers then hear outdated or wrong options.

3. List the customer channels on which your AI agents can hold a conversation with customers in production today, marking each channel as generally available, beta or roadmap.

Why it matters. If the AI agent works only on some channels, the buyer must build and maintain separate self-service for the rest or leave those channels without self-service. Beta or roadmap channels cannot carry live customer traffic at go-live.

Capability areas

Routing, Queues & Orchestration (13)

In: rule-based and skills/proficiency routing, priority and returning-caller routing, distribution methods, wait-time widening, overflow, business hours and holiday calendars, emergency closure, block lists, anonymous caller ID handling, one routing engine and agent capacity model across channels, and scheduled routing changes. Out: IVR menu design (IVR) and supervisor real-time intervention (SUP).

IVR, Voice Self-Service & Flow Lifecycle (10)

In: the visual flow designer, keypad and speech input, prompts and text-to-speech, in-queue and scheduled callback, external data lookups in the flow, caller identification before agent handoff, secure keypad payment segments, flow versioning and rollback, pre-publish testing, and test environments. Out: AI agents that converse and take actions (AIA).

Conversational & Agentic AI Self-Service (12)

In: AI agents on voice and digital channels, containment measured on the buyer's own intents, actions against back-end systems, AI-to-human handoff with summary and history, bot build and tuning effort, guardrails on permitted actions, and per-queue switches for each AI feature. Out: generic AI safety, model governance and training-data terms (cross-cutting AI modules) and agent-facing assist (AGD).

Digital & Messaging Channels (9)

In: web chat widget, two-way SMS, routed email with templates, social and messaging channels in the same desktop, per-channel concurrency limits, and channel switching that keeps one interaction record. Out: chatbots in front of chat (AIA) and routing logic shared with voice (RTE).

Agent Desktop, Call Handling & Agent Assist (14)

In: call controls, blind and warm transfer, consult and conference, expert lookup, hold treatment, voicemail, device choice (browser softphone, desk phone, external number), unified cross-channel timeline, notes and required dispositions, knowledge search and suggestions, branching scripts, agent states, after-call work, internal messaging, real-time agent assist, next-best-action, and after-contact summarization, the agent's own queue counts and performance figures during the shift, browser requirements for the desktop, and how changes to agent and supervisor screens are announced and previewed before release. Out: CRM data plumbing behind the screen pop (CRM).

Outbound Campaigns & Dialer (10)

In: caller ID management, preview, progressive and predictive dialing modes, abandon-rate pacing caps, answering machine detection, internal and external do-not-call suppression, per-time-zone and per-region calling windows, consent controls, list loading, retry rules, attempt logging, campaign assignment by skill or team, playing a recorded message or flow to an answered call before connecting an agent, and outbound caller ID attestation. Out: toll-fraud controls (TEL).

Supervisor Real-Time Management (9)

In: live agent and queue views, threshold alerts, silent monitor, whisper, barge, moving waiting contacts between queues or to agents, live skill and queue membership changes, refresh latency, and role- and team-scoped visibility of agents, queues and recordings. Out: historical reporting (REP) and quality evaluation (WEM).

Workforce Engagement: Forecasting, Scheduling & Quality (13)

In: interval forecasting per queue and channel, schedule generation from shift rules, intraday management and adherence, agent schedule self-service and swaps, data exchange with an existing WFM system, quality evaluation forms, automated scoring across all interactions, coaching, gamification with an off switch, and whether each component is first-party or separately licensed OEM. Out: live supervision (SUP).

Recording, Transcription & Retention (12)

In: rule-based call and screen recording, search and playback, agent and automated pause and resume, regional recording disclosures, transcription and keyword search, pattern-based redaction, retention with deletion logs, legal hold, one interaction ID linking all legs and artifacts, tamper detection, playback and download logging, storage region per recording set, and bulk export of recordings and transcripts with their interaction metadata in open formats. Out: certification scope (compliance-certifications) and general data export terms at exit (migration-exit).

Contact Center Reporting & Analytics (10)

In: queue, channel and interval metrics, agent performance metrics, custom and scheduled reports, post-contact surveys, configurable first-contact resolution, AI containment and handoff reporting, speech and text analytics across all interactions (topic and trend discovery, sentiment), and raw interaction and agent-state feeds to a data warehouse. Out: real-time dashboards (SUP) and quality scores (WEM).

CRM, Case & Back-Office Integration (11)

In: native CRM screen pop, click to dial and lookup, automatic interaction write-back to the customer record, help desk case history and case creation with transcript or recording link, real-time context delivery versus batch sync, time from call connect to screen pop, and contact-center events and APIs for contacts, agents and queues. Out: generic API, SSO and SCIM matters (integration module).

Telephony, Carrier & Voice Quality (10)

In: bring-your-own-carrier SIP trunking and vendor-supplied numbers, number provisioning and porting-in from the console, media regions, per-call voice quality metrics, agent network requirements and readiness tests, media encryption to agent endpoints, behavior of in-progress calls during a regional failure, emergency routing when the desktop is down, peak concurrency increases, emergency calling with location for remote agents, toll-fraud controls, and number port-out on request, including at contract end. Out: uptime commitments (business-continuity-dr).

Demo scenarios

Each scenario lists the data to load before the demo, then the steps to show, and the questions it scores.

  1. Known caller identified, routed and transferred to specialist
  2. AI agent completes a request then hands off
  3. Web chat customer moves to a voice call
  4. Supervisor handles a queue surge
  5. Outbound collections campaign with calling restrictions
  6. Card payment kept out of recordings
  7. Forecast through schedule to agent coaching
  8. Emergency closure after an unplanned site shutdown
  9. Carrier cutover with emergency calling for remote agents
  10. Correcting an AI agent and reporting on it

Due diligence

The workbook carries the screening questions from these modules. Each module is also sold on its own.

Questions about this package

How many Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) RFP questions are there?

133 solution questions in 12 capability areas: 29 for the RFI, 68 for the RFP and 36 deep-dive questions for the finalists. The workbook adds 90 due-diligence questions on security, integration, implementation and exit.

What comes with each question?

Why it matters, good-answer signals, red flags, follow-up questions, how to verify the answer (a demo step, a test or a document), and a suggested priority and weight for scoring.

Can I edit the questions?

Yes. The workbook is an ordinary Excel file. Change, add or remove questions, and change the weights; the scorecard recalculates.

Which license do I need?

The Enterprise License covers any number of evaluations inside one organization. The Consultancy License covers use with any number of clients. Neither allows reselling or republishing the questions.

Before you shortlist

The buyer guide compares the products in this category and what decides between them.

Buyer Guide
Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS)