Quality management in the design of TLC call centers

Call centres rely heavily on the self-service paradigm through the use of an automated IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system. The service time delivered by the IVR is a major component of the overall QoS (Quality of Service) delivered by the call centre. We analyse the structure and service times of IVR systems through a case study of five call centres in the telecommunications sector. The service trees of the call centres under survey are reconstructed by complete exploration and analysed through a set of metrics. The present design of service trees leads to service times typically larger than those spent waiting for a human agent and to excessively long announcements, with a negative impact on the overall QoS. Imbalances in the popularity of the services offered by the IVR can be exploited to reduce remarkably the average service time, by properly matching the most popular services with the shortest service times.