Call Demand: Forecasting & Scheduling

1. Call Demand: Forecasting & Scheduling Planning and management of customer demand within the contact centre operation, scheduling and schedule adherence

2. Understanding “Surplus” conditions Call Surplus Agent Surplus An Agent Surplus condition is experienced when there are greater numbers of agents staffed than is required to adequately handle the volume of calls presented. Agent Surplus results in extended “idle time” – that being the period between calls where an agent is waiting for a new call. Sustained agent surplus conditions can lead to poor preparedness for customer calls, complacency in call treatment and almost certainly increases the cost of servicing. A Call Surplus condition is experienced when the current volume of calls exceeds the current level of agents available to service these calls. Call Surplus results in the creation of “Call Queues” that hold customer calls until an agent becomes available to service. The impact of call surplus is evident in increased wait time (ASA), Abandoned calls (ABN) and a reduction of percentage of calls answered within service (PCA).

3. Forecasting call demand and agent scheduling Planning for surplus conditions

4. Forecasting Call Demand There are a multitude of forecasting applications available to assist in demand planning within the contact centre. Most workforce management solutions include a forecasting function which is integrated to both historical and real-time reporting data to continually refine forecasting and adapt to changes (within the customer base, the vertical and the macro environment) Effective forecasting takes account of several variable conditions: • Static Demand – this is the level of customer enquiry expected to increase in line with growth of the customer base • Seasonal Variation – this is the fluctuation of demand experienced throughout the calendar year (submission time, payment dates, penalty advice and refund dates as an example) • Policy introduction & changes – this is the increase in demand to be expected when a new policy is introduced or a change to an existing policy is advised

5. How to forecast increases in demand based upon growth of the customer base Understanding Static Demand & Seasonal Variation

6. Static Demand • Static Demand is the level of customer enquiry that is to be expected throughout the customer lifecycle • Once calculated the Static Demand can be factored in to any forecast planning based upon predicted growth of the customer base • Lets assume that on average customers will make 2 calls per year to update details, seek advice or confirm current status, 50% of customers will call in the run up to submission time, 25% of customers with a monthly payment plan (40% of total customer base) will call around the time payments are due and 15% of customers will de-register / expire in any given year • Also assume that new customers on average make 3 calls throughout the registration / onboarding process within the first 4 weeks of engagement

7. Forecasting Static Demand with seasonal variation • A customer base of 5m users generates 13.5m calls per annum plus 1.25m calls per month associated with payment plans – 28.5m calls annually • The customer base is expected to grow by 5% per month throughout the whole of the next year • Submission dates are advertised as 30th November • Seasonal demand will commence 2 months prior and field 10% of volume • 1 month prior the volume of calls introduced through seasonal demand is 20% • 60% of seasonal demand will be experienced during submission month • 10% of seasonal demand will be experienced in the month following submission • The planning cycle commences from 1stJanurary as does the anticipated growth in customer base

8. Static Demand Forecast with seasonal variation

9. “What if” analysis and modelling against current forecasts Planning for policy introduction and changes

10. What-If analysis • When considering the impact of policy changes, introduction of new policies or perhaps the launch of a new product or service offering a useful tool is the “what-if” analysis. • A “What-If” analysis provides an adaptive forecast model that helps to identify the organisational and operational impact of a given change or initiative • It is important to understand that an “impact range” should be presented back as opposed to any specific forecast adjustments to account for the unproven and untested nature of changes which impact significant proportions of the customer base • A “What-If” analysis should ideally show how increased demand will impact the operation and (especially where additional resource is required to manage this increase in demand) the expected impact operationally if this additional capacity is not in place at the time required (budget constraints, headcount freezes, recruitment difficulties etc.) – this contrasting forecast is sometimes called the “So-What” analysis

11. So-What analysis • A “So-What” analysis serves to inform senior stakeholders and decision makers of the consequences to be expected in enforcing a policy change without provision for dealing with the anticipated impact • The “So-What” analysis is also a valuable tool when evaluating the benefit realisation case of a proposed operational or organisational initiative – it shows the expected result of adopting a “Do Nothing” approach • The analysis should consider the longer term impacts and cost implications of a given course of action; be that additional spend in terms of over-time, temporary resource or outsourced resource; increased recruitment costs due to greater attrition rates; lost business or opportunity and impacts to achieving organisational objectives or the strategic vision

12. Creating a workable scheduling strategy and implementing optimisation measures in real-time Effective agent scheduling & real-time adherence

13. Agent Scheduling & Working Patterns Okay, so now we have a clear understanding of what we can expect in terms of call demand over the next 3-12 months, next we need to align the shift patterns of our agents to best accommodate this. Some considerations: • Contractual Obligations: Flexibility in contracted hours and working times, maximum “Sit Time”, Flexible working and holiday entitlements • Staff Safety and Personal Constraints: If a shift were to finish at 22:00 is there sufficient transport options which are safe to ensure our people get home? Does starting a shift at 07:45 present childcare issues for our team? Is it productive to have a team member finish a shift at 22:00 and then start their next shift at 07:45 given they have a 1.5 hour commute at these times • If a team member is working a 5 hour shift and is entitled to a 30 minute break during this shift, is it reasonable to schedule their break 50 minutes into the shift?

14. Workforce Management Software There is no shortage of workforce management applications to assist in scheduling agents against call demand, most have the ability to include bespoke business logic or rules to accommodate contractual constraints, policy restrictions, personal circumstances and training/development plans. It is unlikely that any workforce management application will be described as being “pragmatic” in its approach to scheduling – however it is entirely within the gift of an organisation to allow an element of flexibility in order to strike the balance of operational efficiency Vs care and respect for team members. A useful function of most workforce management solutions is the “Shift Swap” feature whereby agents can negotiate between themselves to exchange certain shifts without the need for management intervention, this is generally received as being a positive improvement when implementing WFM for the first time.

15. Action the Actionable Information There is little point in being able to forecast periods of high call demand within the contact centre unless there are mechanisms in place to be able to action and intervene, for example: Next Friday there is expected to be a significant increase in call volumes due to the launch of a new product, non-customer enquiries are likely to flood customer service lines, ASA and PCA are predicted to be significantly impacted and increased absenteeism is likely – its black Friday! Consider the following counter-measures:

16. Creating time and space for development, training, evaluation and celebration Scheduling of “Off-Call” work

17. It’s not all about the call you know… It’s very easy to focus purely upon the task of call handling and ensuring customer enquiries are responded to in a timely fashion, however there are many activities that are essential in fostering a culture of excellence that are not associated to answering the phone. Training and Development of our team members is critical to our overall success as an organisation, creating (and protecting) sufficient time for this to be undertaken is essential if we are to optimise our operations. If our aim is to ensure that our customers feel valued and we care about them how can this be achieved if we don’t display this to the very people who are tasked with talking to our customers?

18. Plan around your people • Training and Development should always be scheduled in and as far as practical protected – fire alarms aside the delivery of planned training, coaching and development review/appraisal sessions is more important than the number of calls queuing right now – customers will benefit from uplifting the skills of the team more than answering their call in 25 seconds • Things Happen! – People get sick, buildings get evacuated, public transport will forever fail us, kids will be kids and we all have a life away from work. Accommodate a level of absenteeism with your scheduling and don’t rely upon offering over-time to meet service demand as a standard practice • Take time out: An ad-hoc briefing about a developing situation may take 10 minutes away from answering the phone but equip your people with the information they need to field enquiries over the next 8 hours! Provisioning a huddle or stand-up meeting to mark someone’s birthday, congratulate their engagement, celebrate a development goal or recognise that “today is not a great day” will not materially affect your KPIs if planned!