The Customer Service Survey
VocaLabs' weblog providing news and commentary on the challenges of providing good customer service.
Hanging Up
Tuesday - August 28, 2007 09:49 AM in
One of the pitfalls in setting performance metrics for call center agents is that if the metrics don't match the business goals it can have perverse effects.
Here's Exhibit A: five call center agents were fired from Nationwide Mutual Insurance for hanging up on customers. One of the five hung up on an astonishing 34%of callers.
The reason, of course, was to reduce their average call time in an effort to hit their performance targets. Nobody who's spent much time in the call center business should be surprised by this, since thing kind of thing regularly happens in call centers where agents are required to hit aggressive targets for the number of calls handled per day.
The twist in this case is that the fired women are alleging that hanging up on customers is a widespread practice at Nationwide Mutual, and the only people who were fired are the ones who were scheduled to take leave (four due to pregnancy, one due to disability).
If true (and the company strongly denies the claim), that would be blatant discrimination and highly illegal.
Either way, though, Nationwide Mutual can properly be criticized for setting up a system of rewards and punishments which lead at least some call center agents to feel that there's no way to meet their goals without hanging up on people.
Posted by Peter Leppik
The reason, of course, was to reduce their average call time in an effort to hit their performance targets. Nobody who's spent much time in the call center business should be surprised by this, since thing kind of thing regularly happens in call centers where agents are required to hit aggressive targets for the number of calls handled per day.
The twist in this case is that the fired women are alleging that hanging up on customers is a widespread practice at Nationwide Mutual, and the only people who were fired are the ones who were scheduled to take leave (four due to pregnancy, one due to disability).
If true (and the company strongly denies the claim), that would be blatant discrimination and highly illegal.
Either way, though, Nationwide Mutual can properly be criticized for setting up a system of rewards and punishments which lead at least some call center agents to feel that there's no way to meet their goals without hanging up on people.
Posted by Peter Leppik
Posted at 09:49 AM by | | | |