What's this number for?
As well as mapping the relevant tickets and calls you want to track, you'll also be required to enter some additional information about your agent's productivity and your targets. This is used to translate your forecasted ticket volumes into a staffing requirement.
What's average conversation time (ACT)?
Average Conversation Time (ACT), is Surfboard's version of Average Handle Time (AHT):
AHT (the industry standard) measures the time elapsed from open to close
ACT measures the total amount of dedicated time an agent spent on the ticket, removing waiting or idle time. Learn more here
ACT is available for Aircall, Dixa, Intercom, Helpscout, Salesforce and Zendesk
Surfboard will produce a ACT metric as soon as your customer service or CRM platforms are connected and your team are onboard and using schedules.
What number should I enter in my ticket group?
It's important to use the right number, based in the reality of how your team works, in order to accurately forecast your staffing and create efficient schedules.
For onboarding teams:
There are a few options available while you're getting started:
For voice: Manually calculate AHT using data in your customer service or CRM platform
If your system does not offer AHT, then you can do a simple calculation using the data available. Take the total talk time and divide it by the total calls handled.
Use an estimated number as a temporary measure
If you do not have actual data to hand, then an estimation can suffice until Surfboard starts providing you with your actual ACT. You can ask your team for an estimation of the time spent per ticket or use some of our examples:Simple queries, e.g. Tier 1: around 300s (5m)
Technical queries, e.g. Tier 2: around 600s (10m)
Specialist queries, e.g. Tier 3: around 1200s (20m)
For live teams:
You can use the ACT metric for the relevant activity found in the performance page:
Go to your performance page and select all your teams, or the teams that work on this ticket group.
Select 'week' view
Select 'by activity' in the breakdown table and filter to the relevant activities linked to this ticket group.
Take note of the ACT across the last 4 - 12 weeks, depending on your preference.
Create an average of these numbers and enter that in the relevant ticket group.
Finding your AHT in your customer service platform or CRM
Dixa
In Dixa, the average handle time (AHT) is referred to as "Assignment time".
Go to the Dixa > Analytics
Filter or find the relevant channel or queue you're using in your ticket group
Find the Assignment time module and note down the assignment time for the entire conversation
Go to Surfboard > Settings > Ticket groups and go to the ticket group you're setting up
Under channel type, select 'real-time' - this means we'll use the whole conversation to forecast with
Now, enter the assignment time you identified Dixa and enter it into the average handle time field. (Note: this needs to be measured in seconds)
Intercom
Go to the Intercom > Reports > Effectiveness
Filter or find the relevant channel or queue you're using in your ticket group
Find the Avg time from first assignment to close module and note down this number
Go to Surfboard > Settings > Ticket groups and go to the ticket group you're setting up
Under channel type, select 'real-time' - this means we'll use the whole conversation to forecast with
Now, enter the assignment time you identified in Intercom and enter it into the average handle time field. (Note: this needs to be measured in seconds)