We know the definition. We know some ways to measure it. But why bother? Isn't this a lot of work?

Well, we could just say that customer satisfaction usually increases. And employee satisfaction as well. But the bottom line is.....the bottom line. A poor first call resolution rate translates into a decreased bottom line.  A great first call resolution rate translates into an increased bottom line. And you could never guess how big the financial impact is.

Decrease Costs of Operation

 Well, that makes sense, doesn't it? Each call fielded costs a certain amount. If more than one call is needed to resolve an issue that could have been solved in only 1 call, that means operating costs are pushed up by extra unnecessary calls. 

In fact,  Dr. Jodie Monger, president of Customer Relationship Metrics, has an excellent illustration of just how much those extra calls can cost you. Here is the formula:

Even scarier: deceasing customer satisfaction can hit the bottom line 5-10 times more than that.  Can you afford that? How can anyone is this economy or any other survive annual losses of $13.75 billion or more?

Improve Customer Satisfaction

The metric with the biggest impact on customer satisfaction is first call resolution. According to the SQM Group, there is a 1:1 correlation between the two. For every 1% increase in FCR there is a corresponding 1% increase in customer sats.

Increase Opportunities to Sell

If you fix the problem, especially the first time, you have a much greater chance to sell that customer something more. In fact, if the customer's issue is not resolved, you really haven't earned enough trust to even think about hinting to them to buy anything else from you. Put yourself in the customer's shoes. And no, don't say, "I don't suppose you would like to buy something else?". Yes, I have actually been asked that.

They have a problem with your product. Customer Service couldn't fix it. And NOW you want them to buy something else from you? Are you crazy?

Fix it first, then you have a 20% greater acceptance of your cross-selling efforts. Don't fix it and try to sell to them anyway and you get a very irritated, and possibly former, customer.

Improve Employee Satisfaction

Handling that second or third call from an irate customer with a problem that should have been resolved the first time is extremely stressful. How many times can an agent do this in a day and still like his job? How could he even imagine coming back tomorrow? Absenteeism and turn-over, thy name is Low FCR Rates.

High FCR rates = higher employee satisfaction rates which translate into higher customer satisfaction rates.

Win-Win-Win.

Reduce Customer Loss

SQM research has shown that only 1% of customers are at risk of defecting to a competitor if the issue is resolved on the first call. As opposed to 15% of customers at risk to leave you if their issue is not resolved at all. 

This type of customer loss has the biggest impact on the contact center's revenues. If you have looked above at the math, you will be way ahead of the pack in knowing how much that is costing annually.

Hope those numbers didn't completely fry your circuits. Next post, we get more into the how's of increasing FCR, some of the tools and practices to put in place, and a collection of links to more resources.

Now that you know the definition of FCR (See Customer Support Metrics 101: First Call Resolution Defined) , you are probably itching to discover the best way to measure it so you can start getting some numbers together.

First of all, First Call Resolution is determined by the customer. That's right, the customer. This is one metric that cannot be squeezed out of the customer service and support system or from the agents themselves. Reports from those sources have little meaning.

The only one who can decisively tell you that the problem was fixed, and in one call, is the customer. You'd be surprised to find out how scary that proposition is to some organizations. I think this points to some suspicions that they already know they aren't performing well in this metric.

Think about it. If you only look at whether the customer called back again for the same issue, you will miss all those customers who didn't bother to call back, who resolved things themselves or through forums and friends, or who just stopped using the product. Maybe even returned it. 

Now, down to measuring it. Here are some Best Practices from the SQM Group:

• Ask the customer to complete a post-call survey over IVR
• An FCR focused survey asks "Was your call resolved?" and "How many calls did you make to resolve your inquiry?"
• If the answer is only one call was made, the customer had first call resolution
• If the call is transferred to another department or tier or service, it still counts as FCR because the customer didn't have to call back.
• Determine your FCR performance by Level of Business (LOB), segment, call center, manager, call type, skill set, customer value, outsourcer, etc.

Since we said the customer is the decider of FCR and using other internal methods wouldn't be very good, here are five methods of measuring FCR as determined by the customer. Again, thank you to the SQM Group:

1. Post-Call IVR Survey: customer completes immediately after or within 1 hour of call, answer whether issue is resolved.
2. Post-Call Phone Servey: customer phoned within 2 business days of their call and asked if issue is resolved.
3. Post-Call Web Survey: customer completes web-based survey within 3 business days of call and asked if issue is resolved.
4. End of Call Script: Agent asks customer at end of call if issue is resolved, link to QA evaluations
5. Voice Menu: Customer asked in IVR menu if this is first call made to resolve issue.

OK, OK, now that I mentioned there were other ways, I will give them to you. But be aware that they are expensive, less accurate, and less effective. They also tend to over-inflate the numbers by about 15% so there seems to less of a problem with the FCR.

• QA Call Monitoring: QA evaluators decide if FCR definition was met
• Call Back: Call record is checked to see if the customer called back within 2-5 business days (apparently no way to tell if a second call could have been about a different issue).
• Case Management/CRM: Agent uses desktop software app to keep track of first call resolutions.

Each of the above 8 methods can, and should, be used in combination as each method highlights a different side to the story and establishes differing levels of accountablity for FCR improvement. So just as you shouldn't focus too heavily on this metric, you also need to know more than one side to the story. 

A benchmark is needed to find out where you are on the line with FCR. You need to know where you started to find out if you are improving. You can also set a target but do not manage to the target. Use these answers as part of an ongoing investigation and improvement project to increase the first call resolution without creating another problem that can lower customer satisfaction. 

If it helps, SQM Group shows about 29% rate of call-backs needed on average while a world class call center usually only has 10-15%. Something to aspire to. And not impossible to reach, others have done it.

Now we know the definition and how to measure FCR. Next, we talk about  how improving your FCR benefits the business and how each point can be used to build a business case for implementing FCR metrics into your call center.

As far as metrics go, First Call Resolution (FCR) is one of the most important and useful metrics measured for the customer service and support or contact center. But many organizations find it difficult to properly measure and determine FCR impact on the support center and the business as a whole. Smaller organizations may feel this metric won't apply as well to them, but it is always best to know how you are doing in your efforts to keep customers happy and coming back.

A great first step to learning anything new is to define it: what is it, what does it do, what is it for, why use it? As with problems, the definition creates a framework to hang the rest of the practice on.

Here is one definition, from Kristin Robertson's book "Spectacular Support Centers: Best Practices for Small to Mid-Sized Help Desks and Technical Support Centers" :

[FCR] is both an efficiency measure and an effectivenesss measure. It is a leading indicator of customer satisfaction because customers want their support requests resolved immediately. Also important to the support center because high FCR saves money. Beware of putting too much focus on this metric without balancing it with re-open rates.

As you can see, there is a caveat at the end of the definition. We know that you only hire the best, most ethical and hard-working support agents for your customer service center, but just in case, keep in mind that most metrics can be influenced by user behavior. In this case, an agent may "resolve" an issue and close it when it is not really resolved. The ticket must then be re-opened or a new one created to complete the resolution.

A shorter, more mathematical definition comes from the SQM Group:

...FCR performance is the percentage of customers who achieved call resolution in one call.

In other words, the name is pretty self-explanatory.

According to the SQM Group, the current call center industry average for number of calls to resolve a customer's problem is 1.4; one-third of customers must call back to complete the resolution. How satisfied do you suppose that one-third is with the service they received?

As I mentioned in a previous post, not all calls can be resolved the first time. Complex problems may require multiple troubleshooting steps, long processing times, or are simply the contact center version of a case for Dr. House.  With a quality product, this should be rare. Increasing FCR rates will give your contact center more time to deal with these calls when they do come in.

Well, that is enough to wrap your head around for one day. See the next post (Customer Support Metrics 101: Measuring First Call Resolution) to learn about best practices in measuring this metric.

One of the best things you can do for your customers and for your company when providing customer support is to answer their questions and fix their problems the first time they call in.

The First Time.

How much does it cost to field a support call from a customer? SupportIndustry.com's 2009 Service and Support Mterics Survey indicated it can cost from $10 to $24. Each time. If a customer has to call more than once to resolve an issue, the amount of money spent supporting that customer shoots up rapidly. Call volumes go up, customer satisfaction goes down, and money goes flying out the window.

Here are some tips and tools for Getting It In One.

Hire and Train:

When you hire a support rep you must find a way to determine if he or she will be able to handle support. Let's face it, being a support rep ain't for the faint of heart. So this rep will need to be able to handle emotional customers, intricate products, and mandatory processes. This rep must be trained about your product or service in depth.

Training must include the hows and whys of troubleshooting, what information to elicit, what the results of troubleshooting steps mean, when to escalate. All parts of the process must be taught and the culture of the company inculcated into your newly hired person who will be the face of your company to your customers.

Create Knowledge Bases:

Create a knowledge base containing information on your products/services, solutions to known issues, steps for troubleshooting, advice from other support reps and other customers (via online forums), anything that could help answer a question or solve a problem.

Clean the data, make certain all is correct, and give your support reps access to it. This puts answers immediately at their fingertips which not only improves first call resolution, but can speed up handle time too. (Better yet, give customers access to the knowledge base from an online self service center - now you have zero call resolution aka call deflection. But that's another post.)

Give Authority:

Once your support rep has been thoroughly trained and has access to the knowledge base, you know what you have to do? You have to let them go. In other words, it won't do any good for this person to go through all the things he is supposed to and knows what to do if he cannot make decisions himself. If the rep is not going to have the authority to implement the best solution without checking with someone, or if he is forced to follow a script or set of tasks without deviation, then everyone's time has been wasted: the rep, your company's, and the customer's.

Give Support:

That said, no one is an island. That rep needs a support framework in order to continue to learn and improve. She will need encouragement, acknowledgement, and a way to measure how well she is performing, including first call resolution rates. Technical supervisors, managers, all the way up to the CEO, must find ways to help this rep succeed, be it with further training, better tools, awards, or other motivation and assistance.

So there you have it.

Hire the right reps, train them, give them a knowledgebase and a support network and get the heck out of their way! First call resolution, here you come.

Now, not every call can be handled on first contact. There will always be problems that require further work or help. But with a higher first call resolution rate, your reps will have more time to deal with those bigger problems appropriately and the customers who can get a fix the first time will be more loyal than a customer who never had a problem in the first place.

 This is cross-posted to the ITtoolbox blog:

Moving from a Helpless Desk to a Helpful Support Desk.

We have all had what most of us call "one of those days."

You know the kind of day where everything goes wrong from the minute your alarm goes off in the morning? Or rather doesn't go off which ends up being the catalyst for the rest of the waking nightmare. The rest of the morning includes missing breakfast, spilling scalding hot coffee all over your brand new white shirt that cost a fortune, a flat tire even though you just replaced your tires, then you finally get to work and the boss yells at you for being late!

Everything rolls down hill and over the cliff, and there you stand at the summit listening to echoing squeal of your day falling to pieces. After all that mess, you don't want to call customer service about something that broke, waiting forty-five minutes for the next available agent only to be passed around like a football moving towards the end-zone. None of us enjoys that experience, so why do we in the business community waste our customers' precious time by putting them through it?

The best avenue to customer satisfaction in any instance is first-call resolution. First-call resolution deals strictly with live phone calls which are resolved with the first agent, so the customer isn't passed around like a football.

A couple of ways to measure it:

• the agent checks a box after the call saying that the issue was resolved, or
• the customer gives a glowing review in a post-service survey.

A high first-call resolution rate is often an indicator of how well a company trains and educates their agents. A business that spends more time training their call-center and help desk employees will have a higher rate of first-call resolution along with a higher rate of customer retention.

Having a low FCR places your company at risk for losing customers, and if a customer has been passed around so much or has called back enough times that they can recite their story word for word in their sleep, more than likely that customer has already chosen to defect to another company the minute that their issue is resolved with yours.

No one likes making calls to customer service because they expect the worst, especially if it has been "one of those days." When your company gets those calls, be the one who salvages the customer's day by fixing it right the first time.