When it comes to gauging the effectiveness of your BPO call center at delivering quality customer experiences, first call resolution (FCR) is the pinnacle metric. FCR tells you how well you are doing at resolving customers’ issues quickly and accurately. When there is a need for further follow-up, customer frustration occurs, which hurts the overall experience. Cost-per-call (CPC) rates also shoot up, which impacts your profitability. To ensure a successful FCR campaign in your contact center, focus on preventing these four common problems:
A Company Push to Reduce Average Handle Time
The amount of time an agent spends solving a problem is central to customer experience. Walking away feeling satisfied with the results prevents customers from needing to call back. Since speed is the top factor in a great customer experience, notes 82 percent of respondents in a LivePerson survey, contact centers often measure high FCR rates against low talk time to determine their success. However, there must be a balance between efficient numbers and ensuring customers feel understood. Skill-based routing and effective agent training are vital to achieving this balance. Additionally, average handle time (AHT) encompasses the entire transaction. Contact centers must focus on streamlining services to reduce hold times, verification processes and agent workflow tasks. This will avoid compromising the quality of the talk time.
Poor Agent Training
Improper agent training is the most frequent contributor to repeat calls. Effective contact centers invest time into developing resources that support an agent’s ability to do their job successfully. In addition to technical preparation, agents must receive focused training to increase their competence in other areas. Such as how to listen, how to express empathy and how to paraphrase the customer’s concerns. Developing detailed call scripts and customer personas enables agents to navigate the varied scenarios they often encounter. The most effective agents also know where to look for answers and how to identify the best problem solver for a particular problem that is beyond their knowledge or authority to fix. This requires an in-depth understanding of company policies and procedures.
Receiving the Wrong Information
One of the worst mistakes a contact center agent can make is to give out irrelevant or inaccurate information. Another is to transfer a customer to the wrong problem solver. This not only results in a callback but also a tense conversation with an angry customer. Giving out wrong information can also result in your company being held accountable for a challenging solution when a simple fix was available. Agents must know which resources are available to help customers solve their problems and fully understand the parameters of the solutions they are able to offer.
Issues are not Fully Addressed
A Forrester survey found that 40 percent of customers do not believe they receive accurate, relevant and complete answers to their questions when calling a contact center. As a result, 9 in 10 customers prefer self-help tools over live assistance. Paraphrasing is an important skill in the contact center to ensure that the agent and customer are always on the same page throughout the interaction. Customers also want a voice in the solution. Encourage agents to ask for the customer’s suggestion on how to solve the problem. Even if the request cannot be accommodated due to resources or policies, agents have more information about which available solutions offer the best compromise. Agents should end each call by recapping the issue to confirm the problem is really understood and the resolution is satisfactory. This gives the customer an opportunity to ask clarifying questions or express their agreement with the outcome.
