Helpdesk Audits - Best Practices

A Tele-helpdesk is an investment intended to provide the customer or end user with information and support related to a company's products and services. This can be for a prospective or an existing customer. The purpose of a helpdesk is usually to troubleshoot problems or provide guidance about products. Company’s usually provide helpdesk support to their customers through various channels such as toll-free numbers, websites, instant messaging, or email.

When it comes to successful customer service, it’s crucial to have an effective helpdesk that goes above and beyond the competition. It becomes even extremely important in case of online businesses as that is their only touchpoint. The following are some of the Helpdesk/Call centre support best practices that can be used when evaluating what a company is doing as well as what it should be doing.

PARAMETER	DEFINITION	BEST PRACTICES
Call abandonment rate	No. of attempts taken to connect to the Helpdesk number	Companies have started investing on their helpdesk bandwidth in order to keep this as minimal as possible.
Serviceability of Helpdesk	Convenience in reaching out to helpdesk executive	Companies are building a self-service mechanism where solution can be provided without routing the call to helpdesk executive. Moreover, the interactive voice response (IVR) options are minimised to avoid fatigue and save consumer’s time.
Call response time	Average time taken to connect to helpdesk executive	Fast response time leads to greater satisfaction. Longer wait times gives rise to frustration which lingers when the conversation actually starts, turning it into an average/bad experience. As best practices, companies have started announcing time taken to connect to helpdesk executives as well as scheduling call-back for customers during high call-inflow hours.
First call resolution	Ability to resolve the query or concern on the customer’s first call	Companies have started giving more authority to helpdesk executives to take micro-level decisions in order to resolve the problem.
Multi-call resolution	Resolving the problem in multiple interactions	For problems which require a solution in multiple interactions, helpdesks are self-initiating a follow-up call along with sending regular SMS & Email alerts about the problem progress.

Apart from the above best practices, it is equally important that the helpdesk displays right call etiquettes during their interaction with the customer. Some of the etiquettes includes:

Opening with a greeting
Usage of customer’s preferred language
Clarity in voice
Usage of positive tone
Ability to understand the query
Empathy with the customer
Ensuring problem resolution
Providing adequate follow-ups
Proper call closing

Thus, by evaluating the customer care executive on above parameters, companies can measure the quality of their helpdesk & can take effective steps to improve the same. Effective and respectful communication with your customers translates into better sales and better relationships and hence more repeat customers.