Mitey Mite was one of the first products for answering service call centers produced and sold by Amtelco, reaching the market in 1982. Call forwarding had just become available, and AMTELCO engineers Paul Henning and Ken Post recognized an opportunity when they saw one.
At the time Mitey Mite was introduced, most answering services had direct hard wired connections linking their client phone lines with the answering service. Many of these connections were wired into cord boards that were purchased or rented from the phone company and provided the main tool for operators to answer and manage calls.
Mitey Mite was designed specifically to fit in one of the available slots in a cord board, with dimensions of 1 ½ x 4 ½ x 8 ½ inches. Each Mitey Mite would interface to one DID trunk from the phone company and could handle up to 100 DID numbers. Each answering service client would forward their phone to one of the DID numbers. Call forwarding was much more cost effective than hard wired connections, and provided time of day control for when the answering service should be handling calls, all controlled by the client forwarding their phone.
The last three digits of each DID number formed the client's account number, which was displayed on the face of the Mitey Mite when a call came in. The operator connected, disconnected, and put a call on hold by plugging the correct cord into the Mitey Mite. The display was cleared after the call was ended, making the unit available for the next call.
Mitey Mite was an immediate hit in the marketplace, and AMTELCO's Production Department eventually built more than 3,000 units. Mitey Mite lead to the development of a stable of related products.
Mitey Mite II sat on a desktop rather than be installed in a cord board.
Alpha-Mite added a display that provided the operator with an answer phrase that eliminated the need for the operator to use a chart to identify the DID numbers.
Multi Mite housed four Mitey Mites in one desktop unit, expanding the number of clients an operator could handle.
Video Mite connected Mitey Mite to a video monitor to view the incoming calls, and was a mighty step toward AMTELCO's next generation of call center products
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