Just on of these calls can offset a contact centre, which has foretasted low contact volumes. So, the Erlang Calculator takes such a situation into account when making its calculations. It is Not How you Think! Have we missed anything out in our summary of calculating Average Handling Time? Some calls will naturally be short and some more complex. AHT should be a measurement or indicator and not an agent target. The biggest problem of aht is that it is an average, and generally the agents have so much variation between their aht that it ends up being a metric that generates variation instead of process control.
Since an agent cannot pick up a call any waiting call when they go to the toilet. Related Articles. What is Average Handling Time?
Average Handling Time is Different from Average Call Duration Ring time and queue time are not usually included in AHT, as these are not related to the period of time that an advisor spends on a call. To find out everything that should be included in shrinkage calculations, read our article: How to Calculate Contact Centre Shrinkage Factors That can Distort AHT There are a number of factors that can distort AHT: Cutting off Callers If you target advisors on their AHT you may find that they cut off long callers or, if a call looks difficult, they may transfer it to another department.
To learn all of the tricks of the trade, which may be impacting call duration, read our article: 7 Tricks That Call Centre Employees Play Wrap Time Efficiency Wrap-up time should only be used for time related to the particular call. It tends to drive a behaviour of advisors trying to manipulate the AHT.
Symptoms of this include: Cutting off calls as they approach the AHT target Not doing after-call work or following up on customers Transferring difficult calls to another department Rushing the caller off the phone Not listening to the caller or building rapport Making promises to the caller that are not kept Companies that have removed AHT as an agent performance metric have often found that, after an initial rise in AHT, the First Contact Resolution rates tend to improve.
AHT is Not Distributed Evenly Once you have measured your AHT to be five minutes, for example, it would be easy to expect that calls would be distributed around the five minute mark, as follows. Please share your thoughts in an email to Call Centre Helper. Recently updated. Satheesh Kumar. P 12 Mar at pm. Gabriel pizarro 30 Mar at pm. Pending the complexity or high-value nature of calls, AHT will be higher. ACW is the average duration after each call an agent takes to carry out post-call processing, including data entry and updates, scheduling follow-ups, and any other communication requirements.
To calculate average handle time, add total talk time with total hold time , then add ACW. Lastly, divide that by the total number of calls to get the AHT. The easiest way to immediately improve AHT is to uncover and determine the root cause of interactions that increase the length of agent conversations. Common monitorable interactions, analyzed with speech analytics , that impact AHT include dead air, hold-time violations, and supervisor escalations.
In some cases, customer sentiment can also shed light into AHT, with negative interactions lengthening the call, and leading to the interactions listed above. With a clear understanding of the interactions impacting AHT, supervisors can more rapidly train agents on how to better handle those interactions, including critical agent soft skills.
For example, if an agent is has a high number of supervisor escalations , supervisors can quickly hold micro-training sessions to coach on tactics to reduce it, like empathy statements or de-escalation tactics. Go a step further and monitor your agents in real-time. While it might sound creepy, live monitoring is interruption-free for both the customer and agent. When supervisors have access to in-progress calls, they know what is happening in the heat of the moment.
If an agent needs help, they can use advanced features like Whisper to coach the agent or Barge-In to take over the call. Intervention here helps the agent for future calls. Part of your extended interaction times could be time spent transferring customers to the correct department.
This overhead can add unnecessary minutes to the average handling time of your customer. Consider adding things like business hours and how to pay invoices to your IVR. While the customer experience is crucial in any call center, the employee experience is paramount. Disengaged employees pass on their negativity to customers — and average hold time can surge in just a matter of minutes.
Pay attention to your call queues so the overall service level stays in check. Make sure your scorecards and displays are beneficial for agents. In some cases, the added pressure of being an underperformer is a burden rather than encouragement. Rather than displaying a league table based on talk time, try gamification to motivate employees. All the above tools and techniques should form part of a comprehensive customer experience strategy. Prioritizing AHT improvement starts with a plan that's specific and measurable.
There is now a trend toward using a more holistic approach when measuring CSAT. By using a combination of different metrics, like average handle time, a business can analyze its genuine CSAT. Rather than firefighting and trying quick fixes, contact centers must plan for the future. When documenting your plan, include these five tools and techniques. But, also spend time assigning an owner and a delivery date. Make sure you have the right communications platform that call center agents and supervisors enjoy.
When businesses adopt a cloud-based contact center, they exert more control over their calls and customer experience. Dominic Kent is a content marketer specializing in unified communications and contact centers. After 10 years of managing installations, he founded UC Marketing to bridge the gap between service providers and customers.
Posted on July 2, October 25, What is average handle time? AHT industry benchmarks Tips to reduce average handle time What is average handle time? How to calculate average call handling time? The most used average handle time formula is as follows: Average Handle Time is the talk, hold, and follow-up time divided by the total number of calls.
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