ARI received a bronze award in the Customer Service Training Team of the Year category in the eighth annual Stevie Awards for sales and customer service. The awards were presented to honorees during a gala banquet on Friday at the Bellagio in Las Vegas.

"I am very proud of our training team, who genuinely deserve this recognition," said Ted Davis, ARI's vice president of call center operations. "The success of our call center training program is due in no small part to the hard work, dedication and willingness of our team to share their knowledge and expertise with our new technicians, which has helped to elevate the performance of our call centers to industry-leading levels. I want to congratulate every member of the team for their outstanding efforts."

These awards recognize the achievements of sales, business development, customer service, and call center professionals worldwide. More than 1,500 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were evaluated in this year's competition. More than 260 executives from around the world participated in the judging process for the 2014 awards.

ARI's award in the Customer Service Training Team of the Year category recognizes the efforts of the ARI call center's training team. This team prepares ARI technicians to oversee customers' vehicle maintenance and repairs. The technicians work with 116,000 shops throughout the United States to verify purchase orders and negotiate pricing. They handle more than 3.5 million calls annually and achieve more than $10 million in client savings each month through negotiated costs and warranty recovery.

The training team's method for preparing the technicians to achieve success includes a three-phase training program that spans four months. A new training session starts each month with new technicians completing nearly 90 hours of training before being turned over to the authority of a call center supervisor.