There’s no doubt about service level being one of the most important KPIs. It measures the
accessibility degree of a call center to customers and can have an enormous impact on
service quality and, consequently, revenue. Each company should constantly measure their
service level and ensure they are implementing the right tactics to improve it. Knowing how
important it is for your business, we bring you some of the ideas on how to increase your call
center service level.
Workforce management optimization
Management of the workforce requires forecasting call volumes, scheduling the adequate
number of agents to work, creating schedules for all the agent and adjusting it when
necessary. Without a doubt, workforce management can get a bit challenging. To optimize
workforce management, you will need to take every detail into consideration. In other words,
you will have to think about historical call volume trends, the number of available agents,
target service level, upcoming campaigns, time spent on calls and other channels, etc. When
you’re scheduling the workforce, don’t forget to leave some room for flexibility if any
unplanned event happen.
Occupancy rates optimization
Occupancy rate shows the percentage of time your agents are performing their work-related
activities compared to the total time that they are logged in. Those activities can be anything
from talking to customers, updating databases after the call, sending emails, to providing
support on other channels. When occupancy rates are high, it means that agents are less
available to field calls, calls are taken immediately and, consequently, service level
increases. Of course, too high occupancy rates indicate an extreme workload for agents. On
the other hand, low occupancy rates show poor workforce management which leads to
increased costs. That’s why it’s crucial to create a balance between optimizing both
occupancy rates and service level.
Schedule adherence increase
Workforce management is vital to ensure the adequate number of agents is scheduled to
field calls but you cannot expect service level to improve if your agents don’t adhere to their
schedules. If your agents are taking longer breaks, going for lunch at an unscheduled time or
spend time at a desk on their private matters, the service level will decline. Managers must
constantly monitor schedule adherence and adjust it when necessary. However, it would be
unrealistic to assume that agents will adhere to their schedule perfectly, so it would be wise
to take that into consideration as well.
Improving call forecasting
It can be challenging to predict the overall volume and the arrival patterns of calls throughout
the day. To do it properly, you will need to think about upcoming campaigns and promotions,
repeated events, market fluctuations and industry trends, product launches, holidays, days
of the week, time of days, and so on. Also, you will need to analyze historical ACD data –
call volume, handle times, arrival patterns, and other factors. The more comple
te your call forecasting, the more accurate your workforce management will become.
Other ideas
There is a lot that you can do increase your call center service level. Besides the ideas
we’ve mentioned above, you can also work on reducing agent attribution which will
significantly enhance your service level. Also, you should consider enabling agent call-backs
which will increase customer satisfaction as well. Don’t forget about enhancing the first call
resolution (FCR) as being routed to the most appropriate agent is key when talking about
customer satisfaction. After all, it’s the ultimate determinate factor of your success.