It is a
call in which the caller abandons, disconnects or cancels the connection before
the conversation begins with the call center agent/professional manning the
help desk of the outsourcing company. In most instances, customers get
irritated waiting in the queue, or get frustrated listening to the recorded
messages, before finally terminating the call. The rate of abandoned calls is
more in inbound call center processes compared to outbound. The possible reason
for disconnecting or abandoning inbound calls is the customer’s frustration
with call hold time. A high number of abandoned calls is an indication that the
caller is waiting in the queue for too long. This eventually wanes the brand
name.
Factors that affect call abandonment
rate
In order
of how they affect or cause abandoned calls, the following are the factors that
lead to customers disconnecting before the final resolution –
High Wait Times –
Most
often the customers only eschew because of high wait times. This results when
the contact center is overwhelmed with calls and are put in long queues. The position in queue directly affects the wait time. The higher the queue position,
the more will be the wait time. According to DataMarket, more than 40% people
disconnect in the very first minute of their position in the queue and even
more (around 70%) in the next five minutes.
Too long an IVR
When the
IVR menu is too complicated or the TTC (time to connect) to the agent is too
high, the customers prefer filing grievances through other modes. This casts a
very negative impact on the customer and leaves them more frustrated. However,
this has become a common practice as it reduces the number of calls landing at
a call center by up to 40% (Source: Gapminder)
Network Issues –
If your
call center has an extremely high abandonment rate (15%-20% or higher) and none
of the above two conditions is true, you must consider switching to another
network. The two common indications of persistent network problems are –
●
Calls
don’t connect or get dropped
●
Intermittent
cracking of voice over the earpiece
Outbound calls
Outbound
calls get abandoned due to unexpected breakdown of connection or the call gets
disconnected by the automated dialer when a live agent is not available to take
up the call. There are three types of abandon metrics: abandon at the VRU
(prompt or self-service); abandon in the queue; abandon at the end of the call
center agent.
In closing
Customer
satisfaction is a cornerstone of call center service providers. Abandoned call brings a negative impact on business. Thus, to mitigate abandoned calls, call
center companies are following some new strategies and methods to reduce the
number of abandoned calls, which in turn help in increasing customer
satisfaction. Call centers are employing predictive caller or call back
technology. A predictive dialer is a telephone control system that helps in
automatically calling on the list of phone numbers in sequence.
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