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Originally Posted by Debsy42
I think a way customers themselves could help reduce the wait time is to have their account number handy or be able to recite their telephone number, so much time is wasted with customers not having any information available and having to go off and find the last bill.
Also taking 5 minutes to tell me how long they have been waiting adds to the length of the call and the wait time for the next person in the Q  |
I haven't had to call NTL since I dropped Digital TV but it always used to amaze me what happened when I did call them. I used to get two bills per month, one for DTV and line rental, the other for call charges and BB. Each bill had a different account number. When you called NTL you had to enter your telephone number and make selections from the menus. When the call was answered I was always asked for my telephone number again (why?) and my account number. I would give them what I thought was the appropriate account number and would get a response saying that they could not find me. I then told them of the second account number and they couldn't find that either. In the end they had to go through the postcode and house number route in order to find my account. So I was doing everything that Debsy just suggested but having all the details ready did nothing to speed up the call.
My daughter works in a large call centre in Nottingham and when she receives a call she invariably has all the customers account details on screen before she exchanges a word with the customer. She has had to drop a very occasional call from an abusive customer but before doing so the customer is warned and a FLM plugs into the call to monitor the situation and the FLM has to agree to the call being dropped.
One of the problems with call centres is that in most cases the agents are given target calls per shift and have a target write up time between calls. Some agents try to get rid of customers quickly to stay within the target as failure to do so may lead to lower pay or loss of job.
One thing that I think is quite good at the call centre my daughter works at is that management will in turn take agents off calls for ten minutes or so to give them a break when it is a stressful day and usually give them a free soft drink and chocolate bar as well.