When we talk about the call centers, one of the most important things is the average handle time or the AHT. It is total time an agent takes from the start of the call until the transaction’s end in a call center. From the end of the transaction, it also means that the agent will include all the tasks that he has to perform after the call related to this transaction.

However, it is not that simple, so it is better to know it worked and its benefits. So, Let’s get to more details.

How does it work?

When you are looking to calculate the Average Handle Time, you need to add the following things.

• Total talk time
• The total hold time.
• Total after-call tasks time.

While calculating this average time, it is key to add the above three mentioned values. Now you will divide the sum by the total number of calls, and you will get the Average Handle Time. It is an important metric when it comes to the call center levels. It tells about the efficiency of call centers and specific agents.

AHT also talks about performance and helps in establishing benchmarks for better performance.

How can you improve AHT?

Better Average Handle Time means that your services are better. All the call centers are looking to improve their handle time. There are some ways of doing it, and here are those:

• Better agent training can lead to the improvement of Average Handle Time.
• Better call routing helps in improving AHT.
• Recording calls and using those in agent training sessions help to reduce AHT.
• Monitoring performance of every agent.

In this way, you can improve the Average Handle Time for your call center.

How is it helpful?

When you improve your Average Handle Time, there are a lot of ways it will be helpful for your call center. Here we will be discussing some of those ways.

Better services.

With a lower Average Handle Time, your services will become better for the customers. The reason behind this is that more customs will be dealt with per session, and there will be more customers whose issues will be resolved.

Lower operational costs.

When you are dealing with more customer calls with the same workforce, you are reducing your cost. Improved Average Handle Time is making more customers dealt with at the same time so your staff requirement will reduce. At the same time, a lot of official time will be saved.

Better contract compliance.

When you are on a contract, you need to meet targets. With better AHT, you can meet the targets with ease. It means that your contract compliance will improve as well.

Improvement in sales and better productivity

When you are dealing with more customers in less or the same time, your productivity will increase. Similarly, the staff will be able to make more sales so sales will increase as well.

Final Remarks:

Average Handle Time or AHT is something that tells a lot about the performance of a call center. Better AHT means that you will be getting better productivity in all matters. Here we were discussing how it works and how it is beneficial for a call center.