Call Center Management Featured Article
Banking Call Center Complaints up, Reps not to Blame
Call center management software has helped the industry become more efficient and knowledgeable in respect to customer issues. However a new study shows that even though complaints about call center reps at banks have decreased, overall customer dissatisfaction with banks has increased dramatically since the beginning of the recession.
Researched published by ContactBabel (News - Alert) confirmed that the past 2 years have seen a 440% increase in the number of complaints about UK Banks. This means an increase in negative calls from close to 3 million to over 12 million from 2008 to 2010.
While call center complaints leveled directly at the service have historically been an issue for call centers, this study found that almost all of the complaints were directed at policies of the bank, highlighting the overall lack of patience that average customer currently maintains with financial institution.
Steve Morell the Author of the report said “Across every business sector - not just the banks - the vast amount of complaints received by a contact centre are not about how the staff handle calls, but rather about a failure of processes elsewhere in the organization. However, it's the contact centre that has to deal with the dirty work, and further failures within the complaints and resolutions procedure (or lack of it) can see customers calling into the contact centre again and again, becoming more irate each time, despite the real problem lying outside the contact centre.”
While the overall numbers show the unrest and distrust that the general public has towards banks and other companies struggling in the recession, the silver lining is that for call centers management systems, CRMs and other products aimed to help the customer seem to be giving service reps an edge. Effective management has shown to decrease the overhead cost of a call center while making knowledgeable representatives available to service customers.
Hopefully the number of complaints will subside as the economy lurches back to life.
Chris DiMarco is a Web Editor for TMCnet. He holds a master�s degree in journalism from Quinnipiac University. Prior to joining TMC (News - Alert) Chris worked with e-commerce provider Suresource as a contact center representative and development analyst. To read more of Chris� articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Chris DiMarco