AHT (Average Handle Time)

What is AHT

The AHT is a measure of how long your advisors are dealing with a customer’s contact, basically it’s from when the contact starts until they are ready (available) to take the next contact. We need this measure to help drive efficiencies and to plan how many advisors we need to handle the volume of work we are doing. Not every contact will be the same but over a set time period the average should give a good indication of how we are performing.

The components

Inbound Calls - AHT is made up of three components talk time, after call work, and hold time.

Outbound Calls – Pre call work, talk time, hold time and after call work.

E-Mails – Time from opening the mail to moving the mail to a completed state.

Web – Interaction time and after interaction work time.

The Calculations

I will show the calculations for working out the AHT for inbound calls, the following is used to calculate the AHT periodically then daily, weekly and monthly. Now these calculations depend on what information you ACD supplies you with, if your ACD will give total time per period then this is better if not then you need to multiply the calls by the average to get the total.

(average talk * contacts) + (average work * contacts) + (average hold * contacts) = Workload

To calculate the AHT you simply divide the workload by the total contacts in this period. If as I said earlier your ACD provides the total times then the calculation is as follows.

(Talk + Work + Hold) = Workload

This shows how to calculate AHT periodically, but to calculate this across a set time or entire day we need to add all the talk time, hold time and after call work time together and then divide by the total contacts in the time required.

Period 1 - (Talk * contacts) + (work * contacts) + (hold * contacts) = workload1

Period 2 - (Talk * contacts) + (work * contacts) + (hold * contacts) = workload2

Period 3 - (Talk * contacts) + (work * contacts) + (hold * contacts) = workload3

Period 4 - (Talk * contacts) + (work * contacts) + (hold * contacts) = workload4

(Workload1 + workload2 + workload3 + workload4) = total workload

Total workload / total contacts = AHT

*Contacts = Handled contacts

Cumulative AHT

When working out the cumulative AHT throughout the day the formula in excel is quite easy. You need to set up the following columns, A = Time, B = Calls Handled, C = Total Talk, D = Total Work, E = Total Hold. If you import your data into these columns then set up the following formula to work out the cumulative AHT.

In the Starting row (we will start on row 2) the formula should be – (C2+D2+E2)/B2

In the next row we have the following and this is copied down as far as needed – (sum(C$2:E3))/(sum(B$2:B3))

Note $ is used to make the value static so when you drag or copy the formula down in excel this value will not change.

If your ACD does not give you the total time for each period then you need to multiply the average out by the number of calls in each period before any further calculations can be done.

Rounding

Just one thing to say here really, don’t do it, well not until the final output, if you round your results in each period then round again when doing daily, weekly and monthly figures then you AHT will be wrong, it would only ever be right by accident, so just don’t do it.

Targets

Setting targets for AHT can be a difficult subject as everyone wants something different for many reasons, the planners want this as low as possible to save money, the forecasters want this as close to what will happen, the customer satisfaction team want this as high as possible, the advisors also want this as high as possible.

I have also found that if you set a target let’s say 300 seconds but reward staff for being under this then they will try and clear each call as quickly as possible, to be below the target but they may not service the customer’s needs so this can create spin calls as the customer has to contact again to have this done.

But if you set deviation bands around the target let’s say 290-310 as the highest band then 270-330 as the next band and 240-360 as the final band you will find the advisors will service the customer and try to hit your 300 target rather than get under it, while doing this they will keep the customer satisfaction scores higher as they will have enough time to service the customer’s needs.

In conclusion the AHT is used to drive efficiencies in a contact centre but maybe should be also used more to help the customer, I have worked with both top targets and deviation targets and I believe the deviation targets are more beneficial to both the centre and the customer, the calculations for working out the AHT are quite easy just remember never average an average (a common mistake) and never round any results until the final output.