Qual é a taxa média de contração ( shrinkage ) nos contact centers?

According to Level AI, the average shrinkage rate in contact centers typically falls within the range of 25% to 35%. Shrinkage rates higher than 35% indicate that there are few contact center agents available to help customers, which contributes to higher wait and hold times.

Qual é a diferença entre a contração e a utilização do contact center?

In contact center management, shrinkage represents the time agents are unavailable to handle interactions due to scheduled activities like breaks, training, meetings, and unplanned absences. It quantifies the portion of an agent's work hours not dedicated to customer interactions. On the other hand, utilization measures the efficiency of agents by calculating the percentage of time they spend actively addressing customer queries compared to their total available work time. While shrinkage accounts for periods of agent unavailability, utilization reflects how effectively agents utilize their available time solely for handling customer interactions. Both metrics are pivotal in understanding agent productivity and optimizing contact center operations, with shrinkage identifying non-available time and utilization gauging efficiency during available work hours.

Qual é a taxa de contração ideal para um contact center?

Ideally, contact center shrinkage rates should be at 20% or lower. A lower shrinkage rate is preferred as it indicates that a higher percentage of an agent's time is dedicated to handling customer interactions, thus potentially increasing overall productivity. However, aiming for an excessively low shrinkage rate might impact agent well-being, leading to burnout or reduced performance. Balancing operational efficiency with reasonable allowances for breaks, training, meetings, and unforeseen absences is crucial in determining an optimal shrinkage rate that ensures both productivity and employee well-being.

Contact Center Trends

What is shrinkage in a call center and how can you reduce it?

By Taylor Johnson

January 10, 2023

0 min read

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The call center industry relies heavily on agents being present to answer phone calls in a timely manner.

Each agent can only speak to one customer at a time, which means that when there are not enough staff members, customers are stuck on hold or their calls are missed entirely. This, of course, leads to very unhappy customers.

However, even when you schedule the correct amount of agents to meet call volume, they might not all be available to accept calls. This is why it’s so important to understand and manage shrinkage.

What is call center shrinkage?

Call center shrinkage is the number of agents actively taking calls divided by the number of agents who are not available for any reason. Those reasons can include:

External shrinkage factors:

Holidays & vacations
Sick time
Absenteeism
Lateness
Leaving early.

Internal shrinkage factors:

Scheduled breaks
Lunch breaks
Team meetings & training
One-on-one meetings
After call work.

Other factors might include participating in company events such as farewell parties, or other unplanned activities that affect schedule adherence such as going to the bathroom, taking personal calls, or emergencies that cause the employee to leave unexpectedly.

Why you should be tracking call center shrinkage in 2023.

How many of your scheduled call center agents are actually available to take calls at any given time versus how many are on break, attending team meetings, doing after call work, out sick, or late to their shift? This percentage is known as shrinkage. Understanding shrinkage percentage as a call center key performance indicator (KPI), and how to calculate and manage it can give you an edge in improving customer interactions, average handle time, service level, and your own bottom line.