The importance of healthcare contact center metrics

Customer experience has come a long way in the past decade or so. Banking customers can use mobile apps to connect with service agents. Online shoppers can track every step of their purchase’s journey. Interactions are increasingly seamless, more direct and tailored to one’s preferences – and for good reason. As multiple studies have revealed, 72% of customers want immediate service¹, 67% of consumers expect a resolution within three hours² and 52% will switch to a competitor if they have a single negative impression³.

Amid such pressure to perform, hospitals and healthcare providers have good reason to enhance their contact center experiences. For many patients, contacting a health service has traditionally been faced with a sense of trepidation and not just for the news they might receive. They have dreaded being asked to wade through an extensive menu of options. They have feared being forced to wait to connect to the correct department or, worse still, redirected to yet another agent.

Poor customer experience is frustrating enough, let alone when it relates to one’s health. Studies have shown only 51% of US patients are satisfied with their healthcare provider’s contact center service, which is no surprise given they wait on hold for an average of 4.4 minutes and only 52% have their issue resolved on their first call⁴. Better technology, enhanced systems and quality outsourcing providers are making a difference but many health services remain under pressure to ensure their patients can more easily schedule appointments, access information and query billing questions.

So we come to the importance of contact center metrics in the healthcare space. Tracking agent productivity and team performance is essential for revealing the quality of internal processes and highlighting areas for improvement. There is no shortage of metrics and data available in the modern contact center world and this article will help managers pinpoint where their focus should be.

Source: 8 Best Call Center Metrics to Measure Agent Productivity | Databox)

Healthcare contact center metrics are used to measure performance and areas for improvement across hospital and health service contact centers. Typically tracked using software, such metrics can measure both quantitative results (eg: number of calls answered, active waiting calls) and more qualitative data (eg: agent effort, patient sentiment). Crucially, the emphasis placed on some metrics in healthcare may differ from other sectors due to the need to focus on patient experience. For example, longer handling times is typically considered a negative but may be welcome in a health setting as patient needs are more complex and require a more empathetic approach.

• Enhanced patient satisfaction: tracking metrics related to patient experience allows health administrators to identify areas they can improve to better meet patient needs.
• Improved efficiencies: contact centers perform best when systems are streamlined and operating at optimal efficiency, hence why it pays to track metrics such as average handling time and first-call resolution.
• Quality of care: patient care is not only impacted by frontline services. Monitoring appointment scheduling and wait times can help boost the level of care delivered to patients.
• Regulatory compliance: regulatory requirements and compliance are at the heart of healthcare, with metrics related to data security and patient privacy pivotal to helping mitigate risks.
• Resource allocation: all healthcare providers have a vested interest in ensuring patient needs are met and measuring areas such as staffing levels and contact center engagement can assist with deciding where to direct resources.

Source: Real-World Contact Center Lessons to Improve Patient Experience - Blog (novelvox.com)

Monitoring healthcare contact center metrics such as those below can help hospitals and health providers steer their services in the right direction.

• Average handle time (AHT): average handle time measures how long agents spend on single interactions and regular tracking can allow contact center managers to identify bottlenecks and identify opportunities to improve efficiencies. The general AHT standard for the healthcare sector is estimated at three minutes and 28 seconds and while providing prompt solutions to patients is desirable, it is important to strike a balance. For example, asking agents to rush calls may boost AHT metrics but lead to a decline in patient satisfaction.
• Customer satisfaction score (CSAT): widely considered one of the most important contact center metrics, customer satisfaction scores reflect how satisfied patients are with a health provider’s services. It is calculated by typically asking patients to rate their experience on a scale of 1 to 5 at various stages of the process. A high CSAT score signifies satisfied patients and reinforces positive relationships, while a low score is a cause for alarm as it can signal potential issues within the contact center.
• First Response Time (FRT): there are few things more frustrating for a patient than being forced to wait an exceedingly lengthy time to connect with a contact center agent. First response time gauges the average time this takes in a specific contact center by dividing the total wait time by the number of calls. While a low FRT correlates with positive customer satisfaction, a high FRT may indicate concerns with technology or staffing levels. 
• Agent occupancy rate: agents need to do more during a shift than simply engage with patients, which is where agent occupancy rate comes into play. This metric captures the percentage of time agents spend on call-related activities, including taking calls and pre- and post-call work. While some observers may think the goal is a 100% occupancy rate, the reality is an average rate of no more than 90% is optimal as this allows time for training sessions, note-taking and agent development.
• Average abandonment rate: it is inevitable some patients will hang up before connecting with an agent but monitoring this metric helps ensure such situations do not become commonplace. Average abandonment rate captures the percentage of calls where customers give up on a call before making contact and while a rate of 5-8% is no cause for concern, questions need to be asked if it exceeds 10%. Be it understaffing during peak hours or technical issues that hinder agent efficiency, every abandoned call represents a potentially unhappy patient.
• Average wait time (AWT): in a similar vein, average wait time is a priority for healthcare contact centers as there are few faster ways to erode patient goodwill than forcing them to sit on hold for lengthy periods. Calculated by adding the total wait times for all answered calls and dividing it by the number of answered calls, tracking AWT enables managers to significantly improve agent performance, better allocate contact center resources and prevent negative patient experiences.

Conclusion

One of the most important metrics for healthcare providers is patient satisfaction but administrators should never underestimate the role their contact centers play in determining it. While frontline care undoubtedly has a greater impact, patients’ impression of a health service is affected by every interaction they have, be it taking too long to connect with an agent, being repeatedly redirected to other departments or failing to garner the information they are seeking. Measuring contact center performance is essential to mitigating such situations and that starts by embracing the metrics that can make a difference.

With credit-rating agency Fitch Ratings having described the outlook for the healthcare industry as “deteriorating”, an increasing number of hospitals and health providers are exploring new ways of doing business. Discover five benefits of outsourcing in the healthcare sector.