Setting up quality measures for customer service

Setting up Quality Measures

Providing quality service is one of the most important aspects of a successful business. According to a survey, around 68% of customers say they are willing to pay extra for a product or service from a brand known to offer a good customer service experience. Hence, maintaining quality in your customer service becomes a mandatory requirement.

Now the question arises – where to begin?

Don’t worry, we got you covered. To realize what good customer service is, we need to create a checklist that your customer service agents could follow to make sure they are doing justice to your brand name.

This checklist can help you determine what will make your customer’s experience worth using your service. This checklist can later be converted into metrics, eventually deciding your team’s quality assurance scores.

What all to look for when creating your checklist?

1. How are you going to treat your customers?

A friendly attitude to create a rapport with the customer can go a long way in making a permanent relationship.
Showing empathy whenever required, shows that you care enough for your customers and are willing to work with them in order to solve their problems.
Sounding too professional can lead to customer frustration, where they can realize that they want to talk to a real person rather than a robot. Sarcasm should absolutely be discarded.

2. How well have you understood the problem?

Comprehending the customer’s issue correctly is the key to this business. You will only be able to solve the problem if you understand what the problem is. Hence, paying attention to your customers is very important.
You must ensure that you have enough information to proceed with the resolution. Sometimes, the customers fail to show us the complete picture on their own. Hence, we should ask them relevant questions to better understand their problem.

3. How well do you know about the product/service you are selling?

Having absolute confidence in your product/service is necessary to answer any of the customer queries. Knowing the ins and outs of your product will give you that edge over your competitors, where you can tell your customers how to benefit the most from your product/service.

4. How well can you reciprocate your resolution?

Making it easy for your customers to understand should be the first step toward providing a resolution.
Customers have the right to know everything that is going on with the service or the product they have purchased. Hence, explaining the situation in a manner to which the customer can relate the most becomes essential.
Also, there are certain things that customers might still need to learn about. Then it should be your job to make the customer aware of them so that they know what to expect in the future if a similar situation arises.
Setting correct expectations is the most important part of reciprocating a resolution. Without it, the resolution is just like a cake without bread. The customers should know what caused the problem, what is currently going on, and what to expect in the near future.

5. How well have you handled the case (overall)?

Check all the other parameters and field options that should be marked correctly based on the CRM you are using to handle your customer support.
Personalization of messages, using correct grammar, long hold times, and dead air (for calls), should be kept under check.

6. Does the conversation b/w the agent and the customer, in any way, impact the business negatively/legally?

This is the most important point where business integrity is at stake. Providing the most appropriate and correct information regarding the product or service can ensure no legal action can be taken and that the customers have the best experience.
Data compliance also plays an important role in maintaining the company’s integrity, which shows its customers that their data is safe. Therefore, a data compliance policy must be set in place to protect customer data.
Last but not least, setting correct expectations with the customer under any circumstances is absolutely essential. It is possible that the information provided by the agent is accurate as far as the company policies are concerned however, they do not make any sense based on the question the customer has asked and does not fit the situation. In such cases, the liability of a false promise or wrong expectation setting can fall as a legal consequence in the future, which should be prevented under any circumstances.

Scoring such parameters

Scoring these parameters must be based on the severity of the consequences in case any of them is not followed by the agents. Hence, these parameters can be bifurcated into two categories – Critical & Non-Critical parameters.

Non-critical parameters are those which will have a scope for improvement in the future, which means that if an agent fails to fulfill any of those parameters, there will still be a chance for them to redeem themselves and fix it in future instances and also it will not impact the business under a legal circumstance whatsoever.
Critical parameters, on the other hand, are susceptible parameters that can directly or indirectly affect the business in more than one way and may lead to legal consequences.
The scoring for the above two parameters can also be done in a definitive fashion. Non-Critical Parameters should be assigned a higher percentage of the achievable score as there is a scope for improvement in the same. They do not impact the business heavily, whereas the Critical Parameters should be assigned a lesser percentage of the achievable score as there is no scope for improvement and should be considered as Zero Tolerance Instances. This type of scoring for Non-Critical Parameters will impact the individual parameters only; however, the scoring for the Critical Parameters will impact the overall scores simultaneously.

Let me explain it better; suppose you assign 10 marks for a Non-Critical Parameter and 5 marks for a Critical Parameter. Now an agent makes a mistake and gets a mark down on an NCP, so their score will go down just by 10 marks, and they would still achieve 90 marks (considering the total score is 100). Now if an agent makes a mistake and gets a markdown on any of the Critical Parameters, they will only get a markdown for 5 marks on that particular parameter. Still, the final score of the conversation will be Zero out of 100 as it will be expected that no Critical Parameter will fail to be fulfilled.

QA Measurements

Here are the critical Parameters:

Correct Information Provided: The information provided by the agent on a case to the customer should be appropriate and accurate as far as the company policies are concerned.
Ticket Closed Correctly: This parameter revolves around the work avoidance policy. You can read more about it here. If any of the guidelines from that policy is not followed intentionally or if there is a noticeable trend in cases that can be considered as work avoidance, agents could be marked down on this parameter.
Sensitive Data Breach: This parameter revolves around the data compliance policy. This parameter is enforced to ensure that the agents protect your customer’s data and your company’s privacy policy. You can refer to some common information that can be considered sensitive here.
False Promise/ Falsely Exceeding Customer’s Expectation: This parameter states that the information provided in any case to the customer should be appropriate and true to the situation and not just correct as per company policies. If the information provided by an agent is correct as per company policy but is incorrect or irrelevant altogether based on the customer’s situation, then the agent must get marked on this parameter.
Non-Critical Parameters: I will mention some questions you must ask yourself when marking these parameters.
Empathy/Tone: Whether the agent was empathetic and cordial with the customer? Does the agent’s tone sound rude, sarcastic, or insolent toward the customer?
Active Listening: Did the agent listen to all the customer’s concerns? Were they able to comprehend the issue?
Probing: Did the agent ask the right questions to the customer to understand the issue better? Also, are the questions asked relevant, or could the research have been done better on the agent’s end?
Product Knowledge: How well does the agent know the product? Did they comprehend the issue correctly?
Complete and Best Possible Resolution: Did the agent provide the best possible resolution, and was it complete in every sense? Did the agent address and answered all the questions asked by the customer? Providing the best possible resolution depends on how well the customer understands the issue.
Explanation/Teaching: How well did the agent explain the circumstances to the customer? Did the agent mention why the issue occurred and what is currently happening with the customer?
Expectation Setting: What should the customer do next, or what is expected of the customer now? Setting correct expectations along with the proper explanation is also a part of providing a complete resolution.
Ticket/Case Handling: How well was the case handled? Did the agent personalize the conversation and tried to build a rapport while showing empathy? Were there any grammar mistakes?

These are the few common parameters that can be used in any customer service process. Quality Assurance is one of the most important aspects of customer service, and it seems clear from the above context that it is not that hard to understand and implement. We at BolsterBiz help companies decide and implement such methods and processes for small and medium-sized companies so that we can grow together and provide some value to your business.