Monday, December 29, 2008

U.K. Call Centers Performing to Expectations

Commissioned by fifty of the U.K.'s leading call centers, new independent research has shown that 93 percent of customers get through to the call center on their first attempt. This study is part of The Top 50 Call Center Initiative, commissioned by Siemens.

The number of customers reaching the call center on first attempt rose to 98 percent in the retail sector, followed by 95 percent in the financial services and entertainment, leisure and travel sectors. The public sector returned a performance of 87 percent, lagging behind the telecoms and utilities at 90 percent.

Surprisingly, a staggering 96 percent of customer inquiries were resolved by the initial call. The retail sector proved to perform the best in this area, achieving a 98 percent first call resolution rate. Financial services and telecoms and utilities returned a 97 percent. For the Public Sector, this number fell to 92 percent.

The survey found that it takes on average just 1.3 minutes for customers of the Top 50 Call Centers to get through to speak to an actual person. This figure accounts for time waiting to get through, as well as time spend selecting IVR or touch-tone options, before getting through to a customer service representative.

This study also found that 58 percent of callers got through to a Customer Service Representative in less than one minute. The retail sector performed even better as 74 percent of callers reached the company within 60 seconds. The telecoms and utilities sector was the lowest performing, at 52 percent, just ahead of the entertainment, leisure and navel and public sectors, both at 53 percent. Apologies tend to be lacking in these call centers, according to this study. For those callers that had to wait more than one minute to get through, only 27 percent received an apology for the delay. Again retail performed the best at 35 percent, and entertainment, leisure and travel returned a 20 percent.

Source: Entrepreneur.com

More information on the call center industry can be found at www.supportindustry.com

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