05/12/08

At least once a year, have a thoughtful conversation about service level goals.

Most call centers don’t ever think about changing their service level goal, and march towards the same speed-of-answer goal year after year when there may be very good reasons to have a new goal.

One call center recently switched from an 80/20 service goal to a 70/30 service level goal. They were able to meet it more consistently and customers didn’t seem to mind the few seconds extra wait time. With the staff savings generated by the lower goal, more time was freed up for training and coaching. Quality scores went up. Customers were actually happier, as evidenced by the next customer survey done by the center.

Whatever your goal is now, experiment. Answer slower for a month. See if abandonments go up or if anyone complains. If not, maybe a slower answer is just fine with your customers. Maybe the only thing you are accomplishing by pursuing your high service level goal is driving your agents crazy.

Give it some thought and see if you could answer slower with nobody even noticing. Or see what benefits you might get by answering calls a little faster. Experiment and see what happens.

Note: This week’s tip provided by Penny Reynolds of The Call Center School. She may be reached at penny.reynolds@thecallcenterschool.com.

Have a tip you’d like to share? Send it to: vicki.herrell@swpp.org. If we publish your idea, we’ll send you an SWPP polo shirt.