Supervisor Capabilities | Call Center Telephone System

Supervisor Agent Features

Supervisors may have the option of serving as agents. Supervisor stations may be able to support all agent features in addition to supervisory features from one telephone.

Real Time Displays

Supervisors are responsible for ensuring high agent productivity without sacrificing quality service. The supervisor's most important tool for accomplishing this task is the set of real-time screen-based displays of agent and group performance provided. To be most effective, these displays may be color coded and presented in either tabular or graphic formats as a user selected option. Displays may show real-time status as well as historical information.

Groupings

Any one supervisor may typically be responsible for 10–15 agents, even though the entire group serving a particular function may be much larger. Supervisors may be able to identify agent information for their specific agents without scrolling through the entire group display. Similarly, supervisors may be able to display a subset of agents from several different groups, if necessary (for example, in evaluating trainees throughout the Call Center). This super group/ sub group capability is very important in larger Call Centers.

Reports

In addition to real time information used for daily supervisory functions, historical reports are necessary. These identify trends and are vital to planning.

Reports may include information about individual agent and group performance, trunk usage, transaction codes, emergency recording and alerts. In addition to standard reports, systems may permit supervisors or administrators to develop custom reports, unique to their own Call Center requirements. Raw data is stored for some management-defined period of time, and is available for additional reports for a period of at least a week, up to one or more years.

Monitoring

Displays and reports tell only part of the story of agent performance. To really evaluate agent performance and to assess the quality of service provided, supervisors must be able to listen to agents in actual telephone conversation with callers. This has traditionally been accompanied by a supervisor walking to the agent's desk and listening to the call by plugging a second headset into the station set. This approach has become an accepted part of Call Center culture for many organizations. However, the same result can be achieved with silent and split/silent monitor.

Silent monitor allows the supervisor to listen, undetected, to both the agent and the caller. If necessary, the supervisor may join the call as an active participant at any time. Split/silent monitor allows the supervisor to listen, undetected to both the agent and caller, but if necessary, the supervisor may prompt the agent and remain undetected by the caller. This is particularly useful in training situations, or where threatening or harassing calls are anticipated. Typically silent monitor is invoked on demand, or it may be timed, or it may rotate through the group as calls are terminated.

Forced Answer

When supervisors notice that the number of calls in queue is rising, they may wish to artificially improve the average time to answer (decrease caller time waiting in queue) by forcing agents to answer new calls as soon as prior calls are terminated. This is done by forcing a group-wide override of the wrap/work features.

Move

In the past, supervisors watched Call Center traffic, then physically moved agents to the groups that were most active. Today, it is no longer necessary to move the agent to the call. Sophisticated, intelligent systems now bring the calls to the agents. Nevertheless, Call Center supervisors want to retain the option of moving agents between groups should the need arise. Thus, systems offer an agent Move command that allows agents to be moved even while busy on an incoming/ outbound call. At the end of the call, that call's statistics apply to the original group. Then the agent should get his or her next call from the new group.

Messaging

When supervisors walked around the Call Center to monitor agent activity, they could easily stop and speak to any agent at any time. Now that Call Center systems have eliminated the need to actually go to the agent's work station, supervisors must find a new way to "talk" with their agents: hence, supervisor-to-agent messaging. Supervisors can send text messages to agent telephone displays. These messages may be predefined: "Good job!" or "Waiting time down 15 minutes" or may be created as needed. Alternatively, the supervisor may be authorized to send messages using a wall mounted display unit. Unlike display phone messaging, the wall-mounted display message is visible to everyone in the viewing area.

Agent Capabilities | Call Center Telephone System

Sign-On/Off

Agents may serve more than one group and may rotate among several workstations during a shift or during a week. In order to monitor and evaluate agent performance, it is important to be able to track which agent is at which telephone. Each time agents make a change, they are asked to sign on and sign off the group they are serving. Automatic sign on/off processes save time and prevent abuse of the system. Using screen-based software programs, supervisors may also move agents from one group to another.

ID/Password

Agents may sign on using an identification number, with or without a password. The ID and password should be viable from any agent workstation, freeing agents to work at any desk during any shift. When agents serve multiple groups, tracking requirements will determine whether or not the agent uses the same or different ID and password for each group served.

Auto Answer/Auto Release

Automatic Answer and Automatic Release are features frequently used together and in conjunction with headset operations. With Auto Answer, agents receive calls without lifting a handset or depressing a button on the telephone. Agents may be alerted to the incoming call with a ring, beep, message, zip tone or other indicator. Auto release terminates the call when the local or long distance carrier disconnects. Thus, the agent is immediately freed to move on to other activities such as follow-up paperwork or receiving the next call. This feature also prevents agents from adding seconds or minutes to each call by delaying release. Auto release serves as a productivity tool for the agent and as an anti-abuse measure for management.

Call Alert

Work conditions in a busy Call Center would be unbearable if all telephones rang with every incoming call. Silent room conditions (where telephones do not have an audible ring) improve morale and productivity. Alternative means of alerting agents to incoming calls include:

• Audible ring, ring-beep, zip tone (sounds a like a zipper being opened quickly, heard only by the agent) for agents with a headset.

• A brief announcement, which may relate to call origin or may prompt the agent for a unique greeting. Also used for agents with a headset.

• Visible indicator such as a flashing lamp or phone display, typically with incoming line or caller information.

Wrap/Work

Call Center managers must be careful to balance pressure for agent productivity against increasing agent stress and frustration. Wrap and Work are features that allow the agents some period of time between calls to complete call-related paperwork.

Management may predefine the wrap period, or may allow agents to invoke Wrap as needed.

Work is a similar feature, allowing agents time to complete call-related tasks. Unlike Wrap, Work is not an automatic feature. Agents place themselves in and out of Work as needed. While some systems may combine these two features, they should be defined and reported/displayed separately for better evaluation of agent performance.

Transaction Code

In addition to any database information agents may enter into the caller's profile, there may be a need to collect other call-related information. For example, agents may collect information on "method of payment," "how caller heard about the company or offering", etc. This information may be used for specific reports to evaluate marketing activities, meet accounting requirements, etc.

Agents are able to enter transaction codes at any time during or after the call. Codes should be flexible, allowing for multiple fields, and should provide a display so that the agent can verify the input before completing the data.

Emergency Record

Some Call Centers are susceptible to harassing or threatening calls. It's important to be able to document these calls without alerting the caller. Agents should be able to immediately conference-in a centralized recording device as soon as they recognize a call of this type.

Supervisor Alert

When agents receive threatening, harassing or other problem calls (difficult question, hostile caller) they may need supervisory assistance. With Supervisor Alert, agents are able to get their supervisor's attention without interrupting the call in progress. Supervisor Alert may have these features:

• Transparent to caller.

• Alerts designated supervisor; then, if not available, hunts for first available supervisor in management-defined sequence.

• Informs supervisor of agent calling and reason for the alert.

Calls in Queue Display

Agents need to balance providing polite and friendly service against the need to answer as many calls as possible. A "calls in queue display" notifies agents if there are any calls waiting, and alerts them if the queue builds beyond a management-specified threshold. Thus, agents are prompted to shorten calls during busier periods.

Agent Statistics Display

Typically, when agents are able to monitor their own performance they become more productive. Agent station sets can provide immediate feedback for agents who want to evaluate their own productivity. Some of the statistics that might be displayed include:

• Time on line (since signing in)

• Number of Call Center calls handled (inbound/outbound)

• Average time to answer

• Average talk time

• Time in wrap/work idle time (time between calls)

• Number of non-Call Center calls

Agent at Home

Just as management may want to send calls to remote Call Centers, they may want to send calls to individual agent homes or small storefront locations. This capability is particularly applicable for accommodating employees with special needs. In addition, it may be useful in disaster recovery situations. The work at home solution should be nearly transparent for both agents and supervisors, meaning they have the same features, regardless of location.

Call Centers (Telecom Made Simple)

Call Centers
A call center is a place where calls are answered and originated, typically between a company and a customer. Call centers assist customers with requests for new service activation and help with product features and services. A call center usually has many stations for call center agents that communicate with customers. When call agents assist customers, they are typically called customer service representatives (CSRs).

Call centers use telephone systems that usually include sophisticated automatic call distribution (ACD) systems and computer telephone integration (CTI) systems. ACD systems route the incoming calls to the correct (qualified) customer service representative (CSR). CTI systems link the telephone calls to the accounting databases to allow the CSR to see the account history (usually producing a “screen-pop” of information).

Call centers are typically established as either incoming or outgoing. Seldom are they set up together. The main exception is debt collection where there are representatives making outgoing calls and other taking incoming calls. Still, in most cases, the functions are really separate although to the outside client they appear as one.

Incoming (inbound) call centers are set up primarily for some sort of customer service function such as catalogues sales, service or billing inquiries, or technical support. They may be front-ended by an interactive voice response (IVR) systems that take care of customer questions and inquiries that can be handled via computer database look-up’s or via general information recordings.

Traffic monitoring in such centers via ACD and IVR reporting is critical in order to detect and correct bottlenecks and lost calls before such situations becomes crises. Where the representatives are geographically spread, much of this analytical support may be contracted to the carrier that supplies the inbound telephone service. As small sales/service offices become less profitable and are closed, less on-site technical support is available from manufacturers/vendors, and less people are available to provide customer interface, the need for such incoming call centers increases. Consequently this type operation will flourish for some time to come even in face of the Internet.

Figure 1 list the typical costs associated with a call center used for order fulfillment. This table shows that the cost of inbound call center order fulfillment may include a minimum call processing charge in addition to a percentage of sales.


Figure 1: Cost of Inbound Call Center Service

Outbound call centers are primarily geared to two businesses: telephone sales (telemarketing) and debt collection. Many systems use special computer software that dials numbers from a database and once the call is answered passes the call off to an attendant who actually speaks to the person called. The timing of the pass off is critical. Older systems dialed a number and when answered mechanically switched the call causing significant delays between the person answering the call and the representative speaking. Many people routinely hang up on these type calls. Some outbound call centers are designed to deliver a pre-recorded message until an available CSR can be connected. Call center telemarketing services are heavily regulated in the United States and in many other countries. There may be restrictions on whom the call center can contact, the times of day calls can be originated, what the CSR can say, and what they must disclose to the prospective customer.