The Average Handle Time Key Performance Indicator (Time KPI)

The average handle time key performance indicator or KPI is a component of a call or customer contact that BPO (Business Process Outsource) companies or call centers use to manage customers. The employees, or in this case the call agents or customer service representatives, receive calls from customers with issues about their products or services. The call agent who answers a customer call has a set time to resolve the issue or the customer’s reason for calling.The set time is the average handle time. Meaning, the call agent is obliged to resolve a customer’s issue over the phone within the average handle time. The average handle time is set through a series of observations from previous calls of the same issue. The call center measures how a certain issue can be resolved within an average time every day. This information is gathered daily, and at the end of the month, necessary changes are going to be done using the information about the duration of time each call is handled.For every line of business in a company, the average handle time differs. Lines of businesses or LOBs are the different departments of a company. Examples of the different lines of businesses in a company are Sales, Customer Service, Technical Support, and Account Management or Retention Department.If we take a look at customer service and technical support, it is plain to see that for those who belong in the technical support department, they are expected to have a longer average handle time because technical calls take longer than the normal customer service call. Technical calls involve troubleshooting, testings, and technical walkthroughs. As for an ordinary customer service call, simple inquiries about the product or questions about the bill take a lot sooner to finish.Things would also be different with the account management or retention department. Account management or retention is the last department a customer will speak to until he or she hangs up the phone. This department receives the calls from customers who are asking to speak with a supervisor or a manager, and about ninety percent of the calls that go through account management are irate calls or calls with angry customers. By just taking note of the kind of call, an account management representative gets compared to an ordinary customer service representative, and we can see the very big difference.Moving on, in the normal call center setting, customer service usually gets the lowest average handle time, the technical support department gets a longer average handle time. While retention or account management is free or exempted from fixed average handle time because most calls are involving angry customers, and as a standard operating procedure, angry customer are always allowed to vent out over the phone. Having said that, in the retention or account management department, average handle time does not exist.For all the other lines of businesses or departments, the average handle time KPI is based on observations and types of calls the call agents receive.