Remote Agents Key to Bank Call Center Success During Coronavirus

Bank call center traffic has increased exponentially since COVID-19 struck on a global scale. Many financial institutions were able to make a quick transition to remote work for their agents and employees in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, a move that has enabled them to keep up with unprecedented demands on customer service.

According to statistics from Neustar, a technology company with several hundred banking clients, call center volume increased just 3.8 percent in January after the first U.S. coronavirus infection was reported. As governments began issuing more serious warnings in late February, that number jumped to a 21.5-percent increase across all banks. And between January 21 and March 8, Neustar reported a 36.2-percent increase in call volumes across all banking tiers, with a whopping 43.3-percent increase for large banks.

Robert McKay, senior vice president of customer identity and risk solutions at Neustar, told American Banker that wait times are on the rise as well. In fact, the company has heard reports of waits of up to three and a half hours. The average wait time for banking customers, according to McKay, is between 40 and 90 minutes.

Some financial institutions have been able to deal with the increased call volume, as well as the physical limitations imposed by COVID-19 social distancing mandates, by swiftly and efficiently moving their agents to a remote work model. In fact on March 18, Discover was already in the process of moving its 8,000 contact center agents to a remote work model when the company experienced a 5.7 magnitude earthquake outside its largest contact center and statement-processing center in Salt Lake City.

It was bad timing for Discover, which was dealing with a roughly seven-percent increase in call volume from customers panicking about the financial consequences of COVID-19. But the company successfully completed its transition to remote work, and proudly reports that by March 26, 91 percent of calls reached an agent within five minutes. Discover also boasts an average speed of answers for all calls of 74 seconds.

The outstanding results have been made possible through a comprehensive remote work policy. Discover enabled its agents to securely access confidential customer data from their homes using thin-client computers that rely on remote servers to ensure a secure data connection. The company already had many of the devices on hand for a planned upgrade later in the year.

Discover was already offering remote work to its agents as well, which put the company in a good position for a full transition. At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, around 23 percent of its call center agents already worked from home. the company has also been able to divert some call center traffic to its other communication channels, like a messaging service on its mobile app. The app has experienced twice the volume in March as February. Additionally, Discover took advantage of AI within its IVR system so that key words like "coronavirus" could direct callers to the appropriate agents.

Ally Bank also cites a flexible remote work model that went into effect in mid-March for handling an influx of call volume related to COVID-19. The company has boasted wait times of just one or two minutes recently, and credits its remote agents as well as measures like self-service options and peer-to-peer payment services for its success.

And USAA, a company with financial centers throughout the US, has nearly 100 percent of its workforce running remotely. The company, which has experienced a spike in calls about financial assistance over the past month, has encouraged members to use its digital channels like its website and app for routine requests. Call center managers have also been asked to spend extra time working with their team members via remote, one-on-one check-ins to ensure call center agents' and customers' needs are being met.

Edited by Maurice Nagle