Quality assurance is one of the crucial aspects in call centers to ensure all the interactions are as professional and precise as possible. Call center quality assurance helps increase efficiency in all the tasks that take place in the call center. In the modern age, there has been a great emphasis on improving customer experience through digital customer experience. Overall, call center quality assurance mechanisms help you measure the strengths and weaknesses that may or may not meet the benchmark of customer service quality.
Quality assurance, additionally, helps the call center employees to build a sense of confidence, better their skills, and have a feeling of ownership towards their work. They can feel and do all these things while delivering the best possible services to their clients. And, satisfying the customers in call centers means that they are also satisfying their organizational goals.
What is Call Center Quality Assurance?
Call center quality assurance refers to providing high-quality customer service as per the business standards. The major aspects of call center quality assurance include monitoring and evaluating every call, regulating a trustworthy feedback mechanism, analysis of performance metrics, and training/ coaching call center agents to encourage growth and efforts in the long run.
Moreover, the call center quality assurance process also includes eliminating the inefficiencies and weaknesses that are seen in the past and present call center agent’s performances or the quality of service that is being delivered. Therefore, it is a must to encourage and establish call center quality assurance throughout the operation of such organizations.
What is the importance of Call Center Quality Assurance?
Call center quality assurance is a necessity for every customer service-providing organization. Without emphasizing the quality of services provided by call centers, a service business cannot be fostered. The following are some importance of call center quality assurance:
Customer satisfaction
Call center quality assurance helps customers get the best possible service from the agents working in the call center. The customers will not get to experience a gap in receiving good customer service. And, maintaining high-quality customer service means that there is always a good chance for customers to prefer your company over others as they are always satisfied with the service delivery.
Consistency
Quality assurance in call centers also helps the agents make sure their services are consistent. Lack of call center quality assurance means that the service quality may decline from the past since the agents are not getting as much guidance in providing proper service to the clients. However, quality assurance, consistency, and high quality remain regardless of the time and change of call center employees.
Operational efficiency
Call center quality assurance does not only include maintaining the flow of high-quality customer service but also recognizing the weaknesses of the customer service and working on them. As the clients keep on working on the inefficiencies of their services, the operational efficiency keeps on improving.
Employee performance
The call center agents or employees show better performance when they undergo quality assurance measures. Quality assurance tactics include training and providing learning workshops to agents to educate and train them for better performance. This not only maintains consistency but also improves the agent’s skills.
Risk management
An organization can adhere to legal compliances and avoid risk when it opts for quality assurance. There is always a probability of going against compliance standards or legal requirements when a company does not focus properly on quality assurance. Sometimes, even the internal policies of the call center are not being adhered to in the absence of a proper quality assurance system. Quality assurance practices help avoid all these factors and guarantee as much risk management and compliance as possible.
Best practices of call center quality assurance
Some best practices must be adopted to ensure call center quality assurance. They are listed below in detail:
Set clear goals and define quality assurance criteria
Before moving forward with any other processes, the call center agents need to set clear goals. The call center must cater to the KPIs that are set by the higher authorities of the organization as per the needs of the customers and the organization itself. Agents can get overwhelmed by unnecessary data if KPIs are not set properly. Everyone in the organization must be able to focus on what is important and what is not. Quality assurance mechanisms will help align the goals and the KPIs while bringing about necessary results.
Real-time monitoring and recording
A call center agent takes thousands of calls per week. It can be impossible for the mentors and manages to review every single one all at once. Therefore, real-time call recording plays a vital role in ensuring that every call is taken care of in a proper manner. The call center managers are also able to monitor what goes wrong through these recorded calls when they conduct real-time monitoring.
Encourage customer feedbacks
Call centers are all about catering to their customers through customer service. Not every customer is going to be satisfied by the work the agents or the company do. Therefore, the call center agents need to encourage customer feedback from every other customer. This will help them recognize their weak points and make improvements accordingly.
Benchmarking
Maintaining objectivity is possible through benchmarking. Call centers can take a look at what their competitors are doing to recognize what makes them better or less than them. Benchmarking performances and looking to reach the benchmarked standard can help keep the quality high and improved.
Choosing the best quality assurance software
Before you rely on quality assurance software, you need to check whether it has the best and updated features, user interface, scalability, security, and affordability or not. You cannot always rely on the price as higher cost might or might not mean high quality. Therefore, analyze all the factors as mentioned and do proper research before choosing quality assurance software because it decides the performance of even the call center agents in the long run.
Get the best quality assurance manager
Without human guidance, the call center agents won’t be able to work effectively. The call center authorities must look for a quality assurance manager who has had experience with call center management before. The manager must also be chosen with his potential to meet the company standards, monitor the call center agent’s performances, and design effective training materials.
Early and regular training of the right employees
While it is important to hire the right employees, it is just as necessary to ensure that they become the right ones with regular and early training. Without proper training, the call center agents won’t be able to work as per the standards of the company. Early training means they get to grasp the necessary skills and knowledge early on in their work span and deliver better results as soon as possible. Cutting off training in the middle may also mean that the employees don’t get trained as well as they should.
Consistent employees evaluation
It is important to evaluate the performances of the employees consistently in an organization. This can be done by checking whether the call center agents have fulfilled their tasks as per the key performance indicators (KPIs) or not. Employee evaluation must be done now and then on a weekly or monthly basis with consideration to the size and operation of the call center to ensure that their performance doesn’t decline.
Encourage self-assessment and improvement likewise
In a call center, there are different types of call center agents who don’t work in the same way as the others do. Monitoring and analyzing the work of an employee through a call center manager might not always prove to be effective for all. Hence, the managers need to encourage self-assessment and self-improvement among the employees. This makes them feel a sense of confidence as well as an ownership of the call center and their performances.
Reward and recognition system
While it is important to make the employees work hard and comply with the company standards to ensure high-quality service, it is just as important to reward and review their performances positively. Rewarding and recognizing performances mean that they are going to get a positive motivation to move ahead and do better in guaranteeing high-quality service and dedication towards work.
Accessible resources across the team
Giving access to the company resources to all the call center agents means that you are allowing them to improve their work performance. Company resources include SOPs or standard operating procedures, questionnaire booklets, answers to frequently asked questions, and call scripts. Doing this makes it easier for every call center employee to deliver service with consistent quality.
Conclusion
Customers in the present time have many call center organizations they can rely on. The authorities of such companies need to make sure that they have a competitive edge against their competitors. This is possible by implementing the best practices of call center quality assurance. With the improvement in the quality of the services, profitability, and goal achievement follow always and immediately.
Pareshor Kharel is a customer service enthusiast and the managing director at Kantipur Management Private Limited.
