03 May 6 Ticket Handling Problems to Avoid for Better CX
Today we’re following up on our improper ticket closing blog. What happens to a ticket before it reaches the closing stage (if it ever does) impacts metrics and CX too. These are six ticket handling problems to avoid.
1) Assembly Line Service
When the customer’s issue is assigned a number sometimes the customer themselves is left behind. Shuffling a ticket around in order to tick the boxes of a workflow without considering the customer is an example of poor ticket management.
Useful communication is a key issue in this scenario. A baseline of good customer service is letting the customer know their issue has been received and is being addressed. Even better would be giving them an idea of when to expect a response.
If there is a delay in addressing the customer issue, notifying the customer is better than leaving them to wondering what’s happening.
Finally, even better service is offering a personalized human response that shows the customer is more than just a number.
2) Hot Potato
It’s poor handling passing a customer issue from one agent to another without context or communication (there’s that word again) with the customer. Agents that feel pressured about their performance or who are competitive may try to pass off hard to solve problems to someone else.
When an agent doesn’t have the knowledge the issue is more likely to be properly handled by a more skilled agent/expert. That’s understandable. But if there’s a habit of dumping the issues that require more work, then training, workflows and metrics measurement may need to be addressed.
Difficult customers and difficult issues don’t become easier when avoided. Yes, sometimes a business is better off without the kind of bad customer that drains resources without much return. However, it’s worth distinguishing the truly bad customers from those who actually have a difficult issue or have become frustrated because of bad service.
It’s also worth having apps that summarize interactions like CSAT.AI, which gives managers the ability to look more closely at exchanges to find out what needs improvement.
3) Poor Follow Through and Ghosting
Another type of improper handling is when an agent doesn’t do what they said they were going to do for the customer or just ghosts them. This lack of follow through reflects badly on the business. Customers don’t want to go through the trouble of explaining their issue just to be blown off.
This is not about the customer inquiries that really have no answer. No agent can be expected to have an answer for questions like, “Why doesn’t my sister like the product I bought her from your company?”
This is about dropping the proverbial ball where the customer either has to do the follow up or gives up altogether and takes their business elsewhere.
4) Missing the Details or Completely Missing the Point
Sometimes the agent misunderstands the question or just glosses over part of it. This forces the customer to repeat their question one or more times.
Example:
Customer: Will the shoes be available in blue again?
Agent: The drop down menu has the available color selections.
Customer: I know. The blue is greyed out. Will the blue become available again? If so, when?
Another improper handling issue is when the agent makes an assumption.
Example:
Customer: I never received my order
Agent: Your refund is being processed
Customer: I didn’t ask for a refund. My order wasn’t received. Where is it?
The agent should ask clarifying questions to find out whether the customer wants to know the status of their order, if they should do a reorder or if they want a refund. Assuming they want a refund and processing it right away could cause more work if that’s not what the customer wanted. There is no point in having good response time if the responses are useless.
Text interactions often have misspellings or even incorrect wording. Train agents to ask the right questions to make sure the customer issue is understood and addressed. Providing agents with tools that support their correct wording and spelling helps reduce misunderstandings and may speed resolution.
5) Improper Tagging
When an agent doesn’t use a quality tag the ticket can either be handled by the wrong agent, be shuffled to the wrong place or be lost. All of this affects mean resolution time and CSAT.
This is similar to wrong information or not enough information logged in the fields of the ticket. Accuracy saves everyone more work later, and customer relationships.
As mentioned in our previous article, keep the number of tag options manageable and well thought out. When it’s hard to distinguish which tag to use or if there’s too many of them agents are more likely to choose quickly rather than accurately.
6) Unnecessary Escalation
A workflow for ticket handling and policy for escalations keeps a service team on the same page. They know where to source information and who to transfer a ticket to and when. The lack of this structure can lead to unnecessary escalations when agents don’t know what is expected of them.
Escalations are expensive. It’s important to reduce the need for them. Tickets in general can be reduced by identifying repeated issues and creating a knowledge base or well designed self-serve option that addresses these inquiries. Generative AI summaries help collect and parse the data needed to discover what these issues are.
Make it easy on yourself, and your agents. Use CSAT.AI’s improper handling feature which does some of the work for you. Let AI track your agent-customer interactions for problems like:
- the agent not answering the customer question
- the customer repeating a question
- the customer growing frustrated
- the agent using macros incorrectly