 Zappos I know," or "That's a company I want to do business with." Zappos refers to its customer service representatives as the customer loyalty team. These ads are an example of promoting the ability to easily speak with a live person to get help with a purchase or to return merchandise. With staff cutbacks in many other organizations, it's a striking example of trying to maintain a competitive advantage by promoting interactions with live agents. It's a contrast to Zappos' parent company, Amazon.com, which pioneered the self-service web site with the click-to-buy lease of completing purchases, complete information about its products, and customer rating system, all designed to make it easy to select and purchase merchandise. Using Voice Response Units for Routing and Information via Touch-Tone or Speech Voice Response Units (VRUs) provide information to callers based on touch-tone signals or spoken commands. Customers can call their bank or credit card company to ascertain their balance or learn if a payment has been received. They enter their account number and PIN when prompted by an electronic voice. The VRU repeats the requested information, in spoken word. Value-Added Applications for Telephone Systems The use of voice response technology is decreasing due to the increasing use of the Web to access information. However, to handle traffic from callers, companies justify the expense of speech recognition and VRUs because they need fewer people to speak with live agents. (The terms "integrated voice response" and "voice response" are used interchangeably.) The following are examples of VRU applications. Newspapers subscribers can use it to stop and start delivery before and after vacations, or report nondelivery of newspapers. Airlines can give flight information. Prescription drug benefit programs enable people to order drug refills. Using Speech Recognition to Expand Self-Service Many call centers add speech recognition to their integrated voice response platforms to make them more user-friendly and faster 