Any call center or business, which focuses on customer satisfaction and retention, often focuses on some predefined KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). First Call Resolution (FCR) rate is one of the KPIs that are majorly focused in the customer care departments or centers. In this article, I will share what is FCR and how you can improve it.
What is FCR (First Call Resolution)?
If a customer gets resolutions, which means a satisfactory answer or solution, for his concerns and queries in the first call, then it is called first call resolution (FCR).
The call centers offering support via unified communication channels by using an omnichannel call center solution refer the FCR to First Contact Resolution. It means regardless of the channel of communication used, if the customer receives a satisfactory resolution to his concern in the first attempt, then he has received the first contact resolution.
The average FCR rate is often shown by the call center solution in the reports section for the easy review process.
How to improve the FCR rate?
There are multiple ways to improve the FCR rate and I am going to share the top 4 of them.
- Use the right call routing rule
A call center solution offers different call routing rules. Using one favorite or any random one is incorrect. Use the right call routing rule. This will help in assuring that a customer is connected with the right agent. Therefore, the agent is likely to resolve the customer’s concern in the first attempt. This will increase the FCR.
- Integrate CRM into the call center solution
A lot of time often gets wasted while the customer explains everything about his or her issue and the agent needs to collect several pieces of information from the customer. The scattered information or uneasy access to data often results in multiple calls to the support center to get the required resolution.
A CRM solution can help in saving detailed information about a customer. It can not only save the personal information of a customer, but it can also store previous interactions and resolutions brought for the customers.
The call center CRM integration fetches the information stored in the CRM system as a CRM pop up and shows it within the call center software window. This way, the agent will have all the information about the customer in front of him. This will help in reducing the need of information gathering from customers and increasing the first call resolution rate.
- Ask agents to be precise yet informative
Often, FCR is not achieved because agents get too much into the details or get carried away with their monthly targets. In these cases, agents overwhelm customers with too much information and sometimes unnecessary information. Therefore, it is necessary to train agents to be precise and speak to the point. It is necessary to give the required answers, but there is no need to be verbose.
- Have a well-arranged knowledge base
Whether your agents need to fetch information from a database or you show it within the call center solution, it has to be well arranged and easy to locate. Reducing the search efforts of agents can also help in increasing FCR.
