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Agent status and its importance : II

1.Ensures efficient call routing:

Agent statuses are taken into account by the call center software in order to direct calls only to those agents who are available to take calls. As a result, the likelihood of inappropriate routing is eliminated. In other words, it helps avoid such situations where callers are routed to an agent who is not ready for their next interaction. This further ensures that calls are distributed appropriately among agents.

Call routing 2
Call routing 2

2. Provides the required guidelines to new agents:

A thorough analysis of agent status metrics enables the managers to determine the standard cadence of the work of the agents at their call center. It can actually act as a useful onboarding tool because it allows new agents to have a set of guidelines for how they should spend their time. This helps them to have a thorough understanding of the work they are supposed to do. So, they can efficiently handle all the calls, resolve customer queries in real time and provide exceptional customer service

Guidelines
Guidelines

3. Helps in proper billing:

Agent status is very helpful for billing purposes especially if you outsource your call center. Monitoring the agent statuses consistently helps ensure that you’re not being charged for minutes that agents aren’t actually working. Moreover, it ensures that your third party call center is meeting the terms of your SLA.

Billing
Billing

4. Schedule adherence:

Schedule adherence refers to a key metric that helps ensure that your agents are logged into the queue during their scheduled times. Call center agent status enables you to monitor, measure, and optimize this KPI. By viewing historical reports, you can actually see whether an agent is currently active or is on pause. This further helps you make sure that you’re scheduling enough agents at the right times, and that they are actually available during their scheduled shifts.

Schedule adherence
Schedule adherence

 

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Steps to design an effective quality monitoring process

Quality monitoring process aims at evaluating the agents in an effective manner. It is employed to identify the calls failing to meet predefined standards. Thereafter, you can make informed decisions to make the process better, faster and quicker. The following steps need to be followed when trying to design an effective quality monitoring process:

1. Determine and define the objectives:

The very first step of this process is to determine important goals. Once it’s done, these goals need to be defined along with intended results. Based on the goals and intended results, tasks should be assigned to the various individuals.

Goals and objectives
Goals and objectives

2. Educate the agents about the process’s merits:

When you decide to install a quality monitoring system, you may face resistance from the agents. You can combat this problem by explaining the merits. This would encourage them to support you.

Educating the agents about the process
Educating the agents about the process

3. Call selection:

Non-routine customer calls need to be selected for greater effectiveness of your QA program. These calls include the ones:

i) that were transferred multiple times

ii) those were either shorter or longer than usual

iii) that originated from certain geographies or customers

iv) that involved some particular activity on the PC screen of the agent

Call monitoring
Call monitoring
4. Conduct a monthly audit procedure:
Conducting a quality audit procedure can help examine the various qualities and skills like adherence to processes, product knowledge, call control, courtesy, empathy, accuracy, and clarity of voice. The scoring evaluation should be capable of reflecting the goal of a contact center. Moreover, scorecards or quality monitoring forms should be arranged by categories.

Call scoring
Call scoring

5. Make use of process maps:

Consider creating and documenting a process map for the call center’s quality monitoring system. The document should describe responsibilities of people, their roles, and the techniques/tools to be used. Calls recording should be employed and the agent must listen to his/her own calls from time to time to conduct a self-assessment.

Process map
Process map