This company almost lost a customer and have no idea why. We investigated it and made sure that it doesn't happen to you! Check how - Ticketbird

Don’t be tight on your licenses, it could be the reason why you are losing customers today.
This ticket looked quite fishy, so we decided to investigate it a little.

So, what do you say? Shall we dig deeper?

It all started really fast, a first reply in less than 60 sec.
The agent seems quite engaged by changing the status from new to in progress in less than 60 sec.
Measured: TTFR (Time to First Reply) is less than 60s. Good job!

Mood: Rainbows and Sunshine

Fast forward: the agent requests the customer to contact the account manager to discuss the issue further, gives his/her credentials and BAM! -closes the ticket.
Yes – the status goes from “in progress” to “closed” in less than 2 minutes.
Measured: TTR (Time to Resolution) is less than 120s. Good job!

Yup, that was exactly my expression at the moment!

Normally, by definition when a ticket is closed it means that the problem expressed from the customer is fully solved.

What went wrong?
In a better world, the agent should have a few options when opening a ticket; he/she can either solve the ticket if he has the solution, otherwise he should be able to assign it to someone else, until the process reaches to an end. Most support systems can do this.

Here is what I found 😀

Thinking about what made the agent close the ticket got me thinking about a few possibilities.

By mistake – well it happens to everyone. Wish there was a follow up email to back this option up, but unfortunately there is not so :
Reply Timing – the sooner the ticket closes, the higher the performance rate is for the agent.
Lack of licensing or expensive licensing-prevents the agent from adding colleagues and assigning someone else. It’s much cheaper to send an email and not pay for additional licenses.

Being a common problem, the third option is the pain that causes customers to leave your company immediately. This process is time-consuming and results in frustrated, annoyed and bothered customers. Before, you know it, the word of mouth will make other customers leave. That is the moment you wish you would have switched for the platform that does not charge per user. Take action before it is too late. It takes a lot of time, sweat and hard-work to build a business which can be destroyed in a blink of an eye if not choosing the right tools.

The Ticketbird way? We don’t charge per user. Just add the colleague to the conversation. It’s as simple as that!
Customers like it when it’s simple. You should definitely minimize channel switching (see our customer efforts blog and learn why). In this example you learned that customers do not like having to contact the company multiple times for the same reason.

Obviously… Having to repeat the same information to multiple employees of the company or through multiple channels is the essence of frustrations. There is a lot of old research about this.

Sources:

Accenture key findings: https://www.accenture.com/t20150527T210356__w__/mx-es/_acnmedia/Accenture/Conversion-Assets/DotCom/Documents/Local/es-la/PDF/Accenture-Global-Consumer-Pulse-Research-Mexico-Retail-Banking-2012.pdf

Accenture key findings: https://www.accenture.com/t20150523T052453__w__/gr-en/_acnmedia/Accenture/Conversion-Assets/DotCom/Documents/Global/PDF/Strategy_3/Accenture-Global-Consumer-Pulse-Research-Study-2013-Key-Findings.pdf

The American Express 2012 and 2013 Global Customer Service Barometer

Gallup: https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/745/constant-customer.aspx

Cost of poor service: https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/122502/

New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/09/06/are-you-being-served