Call Center Metrics

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An overview of a contact center agent showing total number of calls, sentiment and energy scores, longest monologue time

Written by Jim Payne

Director, Product Marketing

Reviewed by John Finch

VP, Product Marketing, AI Customer Experience

Updated: 15 December 2024

Contact center metrics meaning: Understanding the terminology

What are call center metrics? What does metrics mean in a contact center environment? Those are probably the first questions that come to mind, so let’s address them at the outset.

Contact and call center metrics gauge the overall effectiveness of customer service teams. Call centers and contact centers use metrics to measure performance, agent productivity, and other activities that lead to increased customer satisfaction. Customer service managers monitor key performance indicators (KPIs) to track how effectively and efficiently a call center achieves business goals.

A couple of contact center managers looking over agent scorecards

What are the best call center metrics?

Call or contact center managers have volumes of data coming in from various platforms that focus on different business processes. Metrics provide a way to monitor, quantify, and understand this data. There are many different types of contact center metrics, and the ones that are most useful to your will likely depend on the objectives of your center and your role within it. For example, customer service leaders might need one set of KPIs, but front-line managers may need a different view.

Executives need strategic metrics and KPIs to track to make a business case for good customer service. In contrast, operational managers need to gather more comprehensive metrics to make the right decisions about serving customers best and for workforce management.

Top call center metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Call and contact center metrics and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) aren’t precisely the same thing. A metric is any measure of an activity or aspect of contact center operations, quantified by data. A KPI, however, is such a measure that has been identified as being vital to that center’s performance. So,. here are some popular call center performance metrics you may choose to track as KPIs:

1. Average call abandonment rate

This call center metric shows you the percentage of callers who hang up before reaching an agent, which is not uncommon in call centers.

2. Percentage of calls blocked

This metric calculates the number of inbound callers that receive a busy tone. It could be a result of:

Lack of available agents and no call queues configured (or the call queues are full), so callers get a busy signal or are routed directly to voicemail
The call center software isn't prepared to handle the call volume

3. Average wait time (AWT)

This shows you the amount of time callers are stuck in call queues. That number is divided by the total number of calls answered.

4. Agent attrition

This metric measures the rate at which agents leave the contact center, usually measured as a percentage over a specific period.

5. Average Speed of Answer (ASA)

Calculates the average time it takes for agents to answer calls within a specific amount of time. When approaching this as a contact center metric, you’d assess the time taken to reply to a customer’s message across different channels.

6. Average Handle Time (AHT)

This metric tracks the average time to entirely complete a customer interaction, starting from when an agent picks up the phone until they complete their after-call work (ACW).

7. Average After-Call Work (ACW) time

Tracks and measures the average time it takes agents to do the work associated with a call after it's finished.

8. First Contact Resolution (FCR)

Tracks the percentage of interactions where the agent can address a customer's issues without transferring, escalating, or returning the call or otherwise causing the customer to reach out for a second time.

9. Occupancy rates

Occupancy rate metrics indicate how much time agents are on live calls or finishing up work related to those calls.

Key performance metrics for customer service: How to categorize them

Using data and metrics in any workplace is helpful. They enable organizations to understand how day-to-day actions affect the rest of company operations and allow organizations to set and track goals.

While each call center has its way of measuring performance, there are a range of common metrics and KPIs in evidence across the call center industry. Generally, those metrics fall into particular focus areas and reveal varied key insights. Before you can confidently answer the question “what is the most important metric to your contact center?”, you must understand those focus areas. Here are the four most common and some useful metrics for each:

Customer experience metrics and KPIs
Call center agent metrics and KPIs
Call center efficiency metrics and KPIs
Call center productivity metrics and KPIs

Customer experience metrics and KPIs

Delivering customer satisfaction is what keeps businesses in business. But how do you know if you're meeting customer expectations? How customers rate their experience with your company’s products, services, and other factors can determine whether a customer’s experience is positive, negative, or somewhere in between.

Surveys show that customers are typically less satisfied when they have to:

Contact an organization more than once
Re-explain their issues
Be transferred
Put out additional effort to gain contact resolution

As such, here are some vital call center metrics for keeping a close eye on customer experience:

First contact resolution (FCR) tracks the number of times an agent successfully handled the customer's issue at the first time of asking. FCR contributes to excellent customer experiences. In terms of call center solutions, FCR is often considered the cornerstone of call center KPIs.

Customers want their issues resolved during the first call, which is one of the best ways to satisfy them and mitigate customer defection. Measuring FCR allows you to know how you are performing and meeting your customer’s needs the first time around.

Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) shows you how satisfied a customer is with your products, services, or even customer service. CSAT scores are usually about service satisfaction and measured by conducting a customer survey. It's a leading indicator of loyalty and long-term revenue from a customer.

This call center metric is one of the most commonly used to understand which factors negatively or positively impact the call center.

Often, companies ask for customer feedback to figure out which agents are adequately solving issues. CSAT surveys typically ask customers to rate their satisfaction with a particular interaction or with customer service overall on a scale of 1-10.

CES in a contact center environment indicates how easy—or otherwise—a customer found it to resolve their issue or get a satisfactory answer to their query. Like CSAT, CES is usually collected via customer surveys that ask recipients to rate their level of effort on a numbered scale.

For instance, you might ask a question like: "On a scale of one to five, how easy was it to resolve your issue (with one meaning very difficult and five meaning very easy) ,?" Higher CES means better customer experiences.

Net Promoter Scores gauge loyalty and customer experience. Often, NPS is also based on the response to a single question: "How likely is it that you would recommend this agent or company?”

Scoring is based on a standard sliding scale, with customers who score nine and 10 being considered promoters, seven to eight considered passive, and zero to six described as detractors. You get an overall NPS for your contact center by subtracting the percentage of detractors from promoters. A score of over 50 is considered acceptable.

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Call center agent metrics and KPIs

Call center agent performance metrics track and measure how efficiently and effectively each individual member of your team gets tasks done. These metrics help manage and improve performance, as well as highlight where you need to improve.

However, focusing on the right metrics is essential. So, what are the top metrics to assess a call center’s agent performance?

Here are some of the most critical call center metrics to track in this area:

Average handle time (AHT) measures how long an agent spends completing a single interaction. Many contact center agents are evaluated based on speed-to-resolution because contact centers want to reduce call wait times and increase retention rates.

Agents with faster AHT rates and who can resolve issues efficiently are typically considered more effective. However, as with many contact center metrics, you must consider AHT in context. For example, taking longer over each call isn’t a bad thing, if it’s what it takes to resolve the customer’s issue at the first time of asking. A short but unsuccessful call isn’t better than a long and successful one.

The number of hours an agent worked divided by that agent’s work availability gives you the rate of agent utilization. Let’s say an agent is on customer calls for six out of an eight-hour shift, the utilization for that agent that day would be 75% (6 hours worked ÷ 8 available hours).

ASA is the average time an agent takes to answer inbound calls, including time while the agent's phone rings, but not time the caller spent in IVR systems or in the queue. An common industry benchmark for average speed of answer (ASA) is around 28 seconds. The longer ASA times, the greater the risk of customer dissatisfaction and the more important it is to look into efficiency and accessibility issues.

Call center efficiency metrics and KPIs

Call and contact center efficiency metrics give you an overview of the effectiveness of your center as a whole. These metrics don’t delve into performance, as such, but rather they’re standard call center metrics for delving into the technicalities of the center and how it works in practice.

Some key call center efficiency metrics include:

FRT is a metric that reveals the average time it takes for a customer to get an initial response to any contact they initiate with your contact center. In the case of a call, it would be the time from when they dial your number to when they first start speaking to an agent. When it comes to a social media message, it would be how long until they get a first reply—not until their issue is wholly resolved.

When callers reach a busy signal the call is essentially blocked. It’s helpful to know what percentage of customer callers are “blocked”. If the number is high, a lot of customers are unable to get their issues resolved, which leads to frustration and poor customer experience.

Receiving a busy tone is typically due to a lack of available agents (each agent's call queue is too full), or means your call center software can't handle the volume of incoming calls.

In inbound call centers, the abandon rate is the percentage of calls where a customer hangs up before speaking to an agent. The metric is determined by the number of abandoned calls divided by the total number of inbound calls.

Why is this important? Because many service level agreements include an abandon rate target. Although a low abandonment rate is a worthy objective, it generally does not necessarily lead to higher customer satisfaction scores.

An active waiting call metric is a measurement that shows how well teams cope with call volumes in real-time. It gives the contact center manager insight into the number of calls agents handle vs. those on hold. Too many calls on hold leads to poor customer experience, lower customer retention, and suggests you don’t have the right number of agents to handle demand.

The ROI of our AI Contact Center

Real results from our customers.

29%

Improvement in customer sentiment

80%

Reduction in time to close cases

19

Point NPS improvement

Contact center productivity metrics and KPIs

The call center manager needs to assess overall performance and how it changes over time. Contact and call center productivity metrics and KPIs help organizations to do so, as well as to identify peak hours, assess shifting contact center trends, and forecast staffing needs. They can also understand the effect company initiatives have had, such as product launches and marketing campaigns, on call volumes.

Here are some common metrics to measure performance and productivity in a call center:

This metric illustrates all the calls touched by an agent during a specific duration. It usually doesn't include abandoned calls. You can break this metric into the following types of calls:

The total number of calls handled by a particular call center agent
The number of calls handled by Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems

CPC tracks the average cost per contact for each call a contact center agent handles, which offers insights into how effective your operations are and can help drive resource allocation decisions. It also offers insight into whether a call center is operating cost-efficiently and allocating its resources well. The formula is calculated by taking the total cost of all calls divided by the total number of calls.

With this metric, organizations assess the total number of calls a contact center receives within a specific time—be it by day, hour, or minute. Some operational managers watch this KPI daily, while executives may use this metric to identify trends over time.

Every call center needs to monitor when agents experience the highest volume of incoming traffic, especially the specific dayparts with higher call volumes. This KPI is helpful to ensure workforce engagement and forecast staffing needs.

This metric enables you to gain insight into the average length of calls over a given period. It’s used to set expectations with teams and help manage their workloads.

This metric measures the length of time unresolved queries stay open if not resolved on the first attempt. Reducing the average age of the query should be the goal. This metric relates to FCR, which exposes the issues, channels, or engagement approaches that lead to more extended resolution periods. The formula is the total time (in hours or days) current open queries remain open ÷ total number of open queries.

To avoid long wait times on hold, many companies now offer customers the option to receive a callback. The callback option requires businesses to track the number of callback requests during a specified time to determine how many customers choose this option. By tracking this metric, it's easier to assess staffing requirements and improve overall efficiency. Because most customers want their issues resolved immediately, keeping this metric to a minimum is ideal.

Repeat call rate is closely related to FCR and helps companies understand how often specific issues or problems weren’t able to be resolved the first time around. Tracking repeat call rates and soliciting customers' feedback can help determine and resolve recurring issues that customers face. More self-service options could help mitigate customer frustration.

The contact center metrics that matter: Summarized

To summarize, here’s a table containing the common call center KPIs categorized according to their specific area of focus. Efficient call centers look at data from all parts of their operations to gain a full understanding of the quality of their service.

Common Call Center KPIs
Area of Focus	KPIs
Customer Experience
	First contact resolution
	Customer Satisfaction Score
	Customer Effort Score (CES)
	Net Promoter Scores (NPS)
Agent Productivity
	Average Handling Time
	Agent Utilization Rate
	Average Speed of Answer
Call center efficiency
	First Response Time (FRT)
	Percentage of Calls Blocked
	Average Call Abandonment Rate
	Active Waiting Calls
Call center productivity
	Calls Handled
	Cost Per Call (CPC)
	Call Arrival Rate
	Peak Hour Traffic
	Average Call Lengths
	Average Age of Query
	Callback Messaging
	Repeat Calls

What you can learn from contact center metrics

The importance of call center metrics like those we’ve discussed is that they help you investigate patterns in your workforce and customer behavior. You can do that by looking at trends in the quantitative data (number-based information that tells you how your call center is performing).

Tracking metrics allows you to measure agent productivity and performance management using hard data. It takes the guesswork out of measuring how well you and your team are meeting the needs of your customers and company objectives.

Call centers are diverse places. You may have a large percentage of your workforce remote working or you may have dozens of team members handling customer calls at the same time.

As a call center manager, it’s nearly impossible to gauge how well your team is doing based solely on observing day-to-day operations. The benefit of call center metrics is that they allow you to accurately measure short-term and long-term call center performance and any noticeable trends.

How to improve the call center metrics your track with RingCentral RingCX

RingCentral Live Reports user interface for measuring call center metrics

Using RingCentral RingCX means it couldn’t be easier to understand both customer journeys and the performance of agents in your call or contact center. You have both key call center metrics and actionable insights at your fingertips to aid business-critical decision making.

Contact center analytics built into the solution gives you a unified view of performance across phone calls and digital channels. What’s more, RingSense AI conversation intelligence makes it even easier for you to grasp and act upon the data you’re seeing.

With RingCX you get:

Pre-built reports and dashboards to track the most common contact and call center metrics and KPIs.
Comprehensive and customizable analytics across all channels and teams.
AI-generated transcripts, call notes, summaries, and more to make tracking agent performance even simpler.

Track your key contact and call center metrics with ease

Let RingCX help you stay on top of your call center metrics and uplift contact center performance.

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