As a Director of Customer Service, your time (as well as that of your agents!) is valuable yet often limited, especially if you have a lot of inbound inquiries. Do you know if you and your team are using time wisely? What areas can you improve on when it comes to time management? Knowing how long a request or task takes to complete help improve the overall efficiency of your customer service system – and the overall success of your business.
If you are on the fence about whether time tracking your tickets is worth it, ask yourself this question: is profitability important to you? If the answer is yes, then you and your business should definitely be time tracking. Think about these benefits when considering time tracking for your company:
1. All the information you need can be found in one place.
When you track your tickets, all the work you put in is saved in one easy-to-access place. If you need to refer back to that specific customer service request after it has been solved, or need to take a break from a ticket for a few days, you have the option to open a ticket and find all relevant information right way. This will not only save you the headache of digging through emails but will also save you and your customers valuable time that could be spent elsewhere.
2. Employee efficiency is easy to determine.
Let’s face it: without accurately tracking your employee’s time spent on each customer request, you may not be aware how efficiently that time is being spent. Time tracking allows you to see the productivity level of your customer service team, whether it be highly streamlined or low. If you are able to see how time is being spent, you can address any possibility of wasted time.
3. Prioritization is easier.
Some issues are more pressing than others; by tracking the time spent on various requests, you can learn which requests to put first (those that may take longer to solve or involve more difficult resolutions) and which can wait. Prioritizing your time will result in less time wasted, faster issue resolution, and more satisfied customers.
4. Deciding which departments need more support is simple.
Time tracking gives you an overview of how much time is actually being spent in each area of your business. If you notice one department is being flooded with requests that eat up a large portion of your customer service reps’ time, you can allocate more help to that area. When you are aware of where time is being spent, it is easier to determine where your employees are most needed.
5. Budgeting for projects, billing, payroll, etc. is easier.
The financial benefits of time tracking are obvious – if you can see where time is being spent, you can better estimate future costs, budgets for projects, payroll, and client billing, and the value of work in progress (the total time spent on resolving incoming issues). With concrete data, setting budgets and lowering costs is much easier than guessing blindly.
6. Promotes collaboration.
Tracking ticket time is an excellent way to pull your customer service team together. If you have a ticket tracking system, multiple people can open and work on a ticket at the same time, which ultimately can lead to faster conflict resolution and a more efficient team. Teamwork in business is crucial for overall success (and it frees up time to tackle more inquiries).
7. Motivate your team.
Knowing your time is being monitored is one of the best motivators possible. Time tracking gives each individual member of the team the opportunity to assess how they are spending their time and see the areas of potential improvement. This insight can lead to better prioritization, increased productivity, and a more streamlined, stress-free routine. It can also be a great way to prove how much effort you have been putting in (in case the question of a raise or promotion arises).
Time tracking can mean the difference between an underproductive, overworked team and a cost-effective, efficient customer service system. With a system in place like HappyFox, you can track the time on tickets automatically, getting your entire team moving in the right direction.
Has time tracking helped you at work? Share your experiences with us!
