Are you available when your customers want you to be? Learn How to handle out of hours calls.

Most customers know that businesses are open from 9 am to 5 pm, and that is the best time to call. If your business is like ConxHub and offers a service that people use 24hrs a day, around the globe, you need to offer support when customers need it.

Call Divert Options For Your Business

Answer Machine

Diverting calls to an answer machine service so customers can leave you a message seems a very outdated option that will generate more complaints and make customers switch to one of your competitors. If a customer does not get what they want, and quickly, they will look for other options. Studies show that if customers can not get an answer from the company within 2 attempts, they will not try a 3^rd time. If your business can not service a customer concern within 2 attempts, you will lose business. Being there when customers are calling is essential for survival.

Mobile Phone

Diverting calls to your mobile means that calls are answered, and customers are satisfied. This could mean that your mobile is ringing day and night, so it is not ideal for you, but is great for customer service and business and brand protection.

Virtual Assistant

Out of hours call divert to a virtual assistant in a different time zone is a great way of maintaining 24hr a day coverage. It could mean that you are talking to someone in the USA, the Philippines or India, but they are knowledgeable of the products and services, and they are proud to protect and represent your business.

Hunt Groups

Out of hours hunt groups through your IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system will guide customers to the best person to handle their concern. It might be sales-related, support-related, or a complaint. Ensuring that your out of hours call handling processes are correctly set up, means that important resolutions are reached quickly and efficiently. This leads to less complaints and more happy customers.

Web Based Information

Out of hours call handling can also involve guidance to an FAQ page, where most of the common questions from customers can be answered. This will need to be regularly updated to offer more support.

Giving customers clear messages about when to call will help to resolve concerns.

Reporting on Out of Hours Call Handling

Reducing the number of hours that are “out of hours” increases staffing costs, more staff need to be employed to cover the full 24hr working day.  Balancing cost and necessity can be monitored through detailed reporting on your out of hours call handling reporting.

Accurate reporting will show you how many calls you have at different hours of the day. If you are working in the UK, it is likely that you do not receive many calls between 10 pm and 6 am every day. With ConxHub we can help you to review your reporting and see how many calls are between 8 pm and 10 pm for example. This could help you to clearly recognize when your business needs to be available for customers, and when you can turn your phone lines off.

Accurate reporting saves money, time, and effort and is simple to set up.

Alternative Options for Out of Hours Call Handling

Call to SMS or Email

Having a facility that send you an email and an SMS when you have missed a call, shows you the customer details and concerns for that customer. These can be monitored and built into your reporting strategy. Answering customers back immediately via email or SMS shows that they have been heard and their concerns will be dealt with soon.

Live Chat

Over 70% of customers say they prefer their complaints to be resolved over the telephone, however, Live Chat offers speed of service and immediate response, so the complaints do not escalate. This can be managed by carefully worded robots (bot-chat) or could be from templates set up as canned responses if we are looking at cutting staffing costs.

Social Media

Answering messages on Social Media quickly stops problems from escalating and shows customers that they are respected and their concern is heard. In today’s fast-moving consumer sector, the faster we respond to customers, the more likely they are to be satisfied and retained.

Voice is always best

Whilst there are several ways we can communicate with our customers; voice is always best. Having a professional member of your team call your customers back and explain, resolve, and support your customers will only help your business. Managing your out-of-hours call handling strategy correctly shows you respect and listen to your customers’ feedback, and you are there for them when they need you.

Success

Offer a call back during office hours, and make messages clear out of hours. This winning combination could be a great path to success and growth.