Increasing call volumes can be indicator of dispute/disruption in the business service, which might eventually result in high complaints/call volumes. This is primary reason why call centers in India and BPOs around the world are trying to introduce some quick fixes to avoid increasing call volumes that deteriorate the business brand name.
In today’s pandemic COVID-19 time, when customers are already suffering, wherein call center companies can earn customer satisfaction for their clients with outstanding outsourcing services. Most companies outsource their customer support to a reliable call center firm because they want professionals to handle customer calls.
Every company wants reduced negative call volumes and increased positive inquiries. Below mentioned are few ways, which may help companies in doing the same:
Segregation of calls in accordance to importance:
Call queue needs to be prioritized with IVR system in accordance with importance level of calls. Team can seek help from different departments of their organization, asking them to keep a check on activities that may be resulting in high call volumes.
A simple change in the marketing plan can help eliminate all disorders. Hence, use the IVR system to differentiate calls based on importance and handle the answering services accordingly.
Overtime:
High call volumes are alarming for any firm, so in order to ensure that company is able to meet call volume, bonus can be introduced to motivate employees to do overtime. Since rising call volumes can be monotonous for the agents, thus incentivizing them with bonuses can help them ease through those extra working hours.
When companies ask their staff to work extra hours and do not pay heed to their mental pressure, the agents might not be able to bring their best and may leave your company too.
Ask for help:
Call centers in India are famous among the BPO companies around the world for strategizing the marketing plan well. Increased call volumes lead to the most dissatisfied customers, which is why companies need to take the necessary steps on time. When employees from other departments come together for some time to handle the increased call volumes, it becomes easy to answer each customer with the same ease and the threat of rising customer dissatisfaction is reduced too. When call volume increases suddenly, hiring and training simultaneously will not bring adequate results. Thus, it is better to use the available resources and cater to customer satisfaction.
Provide work from home option
Companies using software to ease their call center services can help their employees work from home easily. With the help of a cloud-based call center service, companies can easily manage work from home and can simplify answering services.
For companies that still prefer on-premise systems, various cloud vendors can help in easing work-from-home facilities.
Track after-call work (ACW) time
Directing agents to keep a check on their after-call-work tenure will be quite challenging and may make the agent pressurized resulting in negative results to customer satisfaction.
Train your agents to take notes while on calls. Wasting time on re-asking any query to the customer and re-thinking over the same wastes time and even effects the customer satisfaction. Thus, take notes about the important things from the call. Encourage the agents to use acronyms as it helps to boost the speed of the advisors while typing, thus saving time on call.
Root cause analysis for high call volumes
When the business understands the faults in the service that led to increased call volumes, it helps in simplifying the same and controlling increasing calls. Every company wants customer satisfaction and wants to uplift the business processes. The same cannot be done without analyzing the pitfalls of the business and where the organization lacks in boosting customer experience.
Identify and address the shortcomings on the business webpage, check the IVR systems, and simplify the probable default that may be causing an increase in call volume.
Queue Management
Increased call volumes always result in long queue times. Customers do not appreciate providers who keep them in long queues to get the calls answered. Thus, to save customer satisfaction, companies need to work upon their queue management techniques so that gaining customers’ trust is not a dream.
Adding texts in IVR systems can help. With the help of a message, customers get the clue about the expected wait time and the message explains the client the reason why the queue time is stretched. Without a message, the customers might feel that the company is non-considerate about keeping the clients updated.
Motivate the staff
Call center service has a monotonous work environment mostly, which is why attrition disputes are higher here. Since at times of rising call volumes, an increase in attrition would not be good for business health, thus keeping the employees’ morale high is essential.
Help agents get some free time even at times of crisis, award the employees for extra hours so that they feel valued, engage the staff in exciting games while they work, etc. and you will easily uplift your employees’ morale.
Do not Emphasize too much on Callbacks
Providers for call center services should not emphasize too much on callbacks. Yes, callbacks indeed have the potential to gain customer satisfaction; nevertheless, emphasizing too much on callbacks can strain the services at times of increased call volumes.
When there are multiple calls to be attended, it is important to not stress over callbacks for some time. Prolonging wait times of other agents is not a good idea, thus a check on callback service to be done at the right time is essential.
Rather than stressing over callbacks, it is vital to manage queues and stress upon resolving the cause of increased call volumes.
Cancel Leaves
Canceling the leaves of employees is the most common tactic most companies use. When the agents are called off unexpectedly, they tend to come to work without the will to work dedicatedly. To avoid deteriorating the business brand name, offer some incentives to the agents who are back to work. Motivate the agents with some games so that they do not feel frustrated working on a day on which they might have been resting.
Mood plays a crucial role in allowing the agents to give her/his best, thus, companies need to take care that canceling the leaves does not lead to employee attrition. Senior managers’ behavior with the employees plays a crucial role here thus needs to be considered.
Call Forwarding to Digital Channels
There are call centers that handle inquiries well on digital channels. This is one more way companies can reduce their call volumes through digital call deflecting.
At times of rising call volumes, companies can deflect some calls to digital channels. How can companies do that?
Well, this can be done by adding messages on the IVR signaling and informing people that if they want to avoid the call queue, they can drop a text on any online channel and it will be answered as soon as possible.
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