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Skill-Based Routing for Call Centers

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NOTE: This feature is only available for Premium call centers.

With skill-based routing enabled on a Call Center, queued calls are distributed to agents based on the agents’ rated ability to handle calls in that call center.

An agent is assigned a skill level for the call center. The skill level is defined as an integer between 1 and 20, with 1 indicating the highest level of skill.

Skill-based routing is enabled for a call center by selecting the Skill-based Routing policy. In contrast, the Priority-based Routing policy distributes calls by assigning either a Longest Waiting Priority or a Fixed Queue Priority policy to determine which call center has the highest priority.

You may choose to have a mixture of skill-based and priority-based call centers. In this case, the agents who are staffing the priority-based call center(s) are implicitly assigned a skill level of 1.

Assigning Skill Levels to Agents

Agents in a skill-based call center are assigned a skill level of 1 through 20 in the following ways:

  • During creation of the call center
  • By the administrator at the agent’s User level profile
  • From the call center’s Agents view

Agents may view their own skill levels in all assigned call centers. For priority-based call centers, no skills are shown.

Call Distribution

Skill-based routing distributes calls from your call centers as follows:

Situation Call Distribution
Calls are queued on a set of call centers that an agent is staffing. The agent becomes available. Provided there are no bounced calls (see below), the system compares the skill level of the agent in each call center. The agent is offered the call from the call center where he has the highest skill.

If the agent has equally high skills in more than one of these call centers, priority-based routing is used to select the call center with the highest priority, and the agent is offered its call.

Multiple agents who are staffing a call center are available. A call arrives at the call center. Beginning with a skill level of X = 1 (the highest skill):

  • If a single agent at skill level X is found, the call is offered to that agent.
  • If there are multiple agents at skill level X, the group policy of the call center is applied to that set of agents, and the call is offered to the chosen agent.
  • If there are no agents available at skill level X, search for agents at skill level X + 1.
Bounced calls exist on a set of call centers that an agent is staffing. The agent becomes available. The call is distributed as follows:

  • If only one call center has a bounced call, this call is offered to the agent. This is true even if the agent is more skilled in another call center that has a call queued.
  • If more than one call center has a bounced call, the call with the oldest initial offer time is distributed to the agent.
  • If more than one bounced call has the same “oldest initial offer time,” the system compares the skill levels of the agent in the call centers with those bounced calls. The agent is offered the bounced call from the call center where the agent is most skilled.
  • If the agent has equally high skills in more than one of these call centers, priority-based routing is used to select the call center with the highest priority, and the agent is offered its bounced call.

 

NOTE: You cannot use Simultaneous or Weighted Call Distribution group policies with a skill-based call center. However, you may use Circular, Regular, and Uniform group policies.

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