Skills Based Routing (SBR)

In a contact centre, skills-based routing (SBR) can be defined as the ability to route a call to the agent most able to respond to it. SBR takes into account customer requirements that can range from language preferences to product-specific information requests. It can also consider customer value and past and predicted future buying behavior. This sounds easy enough to do when you think of it as simply transferring a call to a qualified agent. But, when you add the challenges of multimedia and multisite contact centres, SBR offers a valuable opportunity to maximize your contact centre's potential - if you know how to make it work to your advantage.

Skills based routing (SBR), or Skills-based call routing, is a call assignment strategy used in call centres to assign incoming calls to the most suitable agent, rather than simply choosing the next available agent. It is an enhancement to the Automatic Call Distributor (ACD) systems found in most call centre businesses. The need for skills based routing has arisen as call centres have become larger and dealt with a wider variety of call types.

In the past, agents answering calls were generally only able to be assigned to one queue taking one type of call. This meant that agents who could deal with a range of call types had to be manually reassigned to different queue at different times of the day to make the best use of their skills, or face being exposed to a wide variety of calls that they were not trained for. With skills based routing, the skills needed for a particular call are often assessed by the telephone number dialed, the calling number or caller's identity, as well as choices made in any associated IVR system. Given this assessment, a skills based routing system then attempts to match the call to a suitably trained agent. The thinking being that an agent with matching skills will be able to provide a better service than one who does not.

As a consequence, the separate large queues that were characteristic of the ACD driven call centre have disappeared. Instead, each caller seems to have their own waiting area that they may share with only one or two others. Rather than being served in the order of arrival, calls are served as agents with appropriate skills become available.

Manufacturers claim that this technology improves customer service, shortens call handling time, makes training shorter and easier, thus increases agent utilisation, productivity and, hence, revenue. Skills based routing has thus become a major selling point, over the simpler ACD that it replaces.

However, independent analysts and consultants argue that the extra complexity of a skills based routing system may not return the benefits claimed. They outline the difficulty of predetermining the skills needed and suggest a poorly implemented skills based routing system may result in poor service because the wrong measures of service quality are being used.

Theoretical work on skills based routing system tends to be more limited, with researchers trying to identify suitable queueing theory and operations research models to represent the problems raised by skills based routing systems. Some consider it a fruitful area of research. Others claim that the traditional queueing theory formula, such as Erlang-C, are no longer relevant for determining staff schedules because they are inaccurate. They also imply that theoretical approaches will not be accurate because of the complexity involved; arguing that simulation needs to be used instead. Though these claim need to be considered carefully as it is also argued that the inaccuracies result from failing to understand the assumptions of the Erlang-C approach, rather than actual inaccuracy with the theory.

Skills Based Routing or SBR in simple form

Skills Based Routing or SBR provides routing of calls based on the skills required by the call. A computer first answers the call and asks the caller to supply information about the caller’s needs. This information is matched to each agent’s abilities and availability and the call is routed. Rules allow skills to be required, prioritized and weighted. Time based rules alter the calls requested skills to allow less able agents to handle a call without imposing an excessive hold time on the caller.

How it works

The routing engine works on the concept of skills categories and skills. An agent may have zero or many skills within a category. Each skill an agent has receives a value indicating the proficiency the agent has in that skill.

SBR has a section allowing for "Call Routing Rules". These rules control:

* How to break routing ties between agents
* How long to hold a caller on a must route queue before rolling over to a general call centre queue.
* What priority "weight" to apply to a skill set. This allows the system to be configured such that while language is a must have skill, operating system is two times as important. A rule set up like this would cause a caller to be routed to an agent with some language skills in their area but, primarily to the person who was most skilled in their type of problem.
* If the total skill score for the best skilled agent is less than (X) wait (Y) seconds, check again. Try (Z) times before routing to the top skill rating.
* Route to the last person this caller spoke to if possible.
* And capabilities for:

          - Agent Messaging
          - Agent Multiple Queue Login
          - Remote Call Centre
          - At Home Agents

Key Benefits

* Callers are happier because they do not waste their time in a call transfer loop never really getting to someone who can answer their question.
* Call handling costs are lowered as call transfers are dramatically reduced.
* Call Centre managers are easily able update and administer the complete system.

SBR takes into account customer requirements that can range from language preferences to product-specific information requests. It can also consider customer value and past and predicted future buying behavior. This sounds easy enough to do when you think of it as simply transferring a call to a qualified agent. But, when you add the challenges of multimedia and multisite contact centres, SBR offers a valuable opportunity to maximize your contact centre's potential - if you know how to make it work to your advantage.

Evolution - From ACD To Skills-Based Routing

As technologies have evolved, so has our way of viewing and managing contact centres. The evolution from the old automatic call distribution (ACD) model, which distributed calls according to static configured parameters, to the current SBR strategy, reflects the paradigm shift that occurred in contact centre philosophy. The ACD model focused on load distribution, or emptying queues and connecting callers to agents as quickly as possible. Call distribution was performed according to configured parameters, which in turn were based on static rules that did not conform to overall business logic. There was thus no direct relationship between the needs of the client and the skill of the agent who handled his call. The corporate objectives served by the ACD model focused on cost reduction by answering calls quickly. In fact, the "automatic" in ACD was often a misnomer, because at peak times, calls often had to be manually switched from queue to queue.