First Resolution Time

When you have a business, your customer’s satisfaction is one of your main goals. Every customer values resolution time. They want a quick resolution as well as a quick reply.

From the moment a customer reaches out to you for help, the clock is ticking for a company to solve the problem and satisfy the customer. Hence, the time it takes for a support issue or ticket to be resolved, known as Time to Resolution, is a very important metric. There are several steps of Time to Resolution for closing a help ticket. In this article, we will only focus on the first resolution time.

What is first-resolution time?

The first-resolution time is the time that it took to solve the issue by a customer support agent for the first time across all platforms such as email, live chat, social media, or phone calls.

The first resolution time is an indication of your customer support efficiency. Ideally, no one wants any tickets to be reopened while also reducing the time to resolve the queries as much as possible. This time is also observed by your customer, and hence, it affects their overall customer experience.

How to calculate first-resolution time

It’s easy to calculate the first-resolution time of each customer asking your customer support agents. You just need to follow this formula:

First Resolution Time = Time the query has been solved - Time the query was asked

However, computing the first resolution time is not enough to gain insights into the efficiency of our customer support. We also need to summarize these records of first resolution time to determine if we hit our target or we still have something to improve. Here are the possible summary statistics you can get.

Average First Resolution Time - This can be computed by dividing the total first resolution time by the total number of queries solved for the first time within a certain period. You can measure this for each customer support agent to determine each one’s efficiency. You can also compute the metric for the overall customer support department.
Minimum First Resolution Time - find the minimum time among all first resolution times. This will help you determine the type of ticket that can be resolved easily.
Maximum First Resolution Time - find the maximum time among all first resolution times. This will give you an insight into the kind of query that takes a long time to resolve. From this, you will be able to analyze why it consumes so much time. Would there be ways to solve it quickly?

How to improve your first resolution time

Everyone has room for improvement! You may have hit your target KPIs, but you can also set higher KPIs. In the same way, the first resolution time can always be improved. Here are some tips on how you can improve your first resolution time.

Be clear on the issue. Information is power. The more knowledge you have about the customer’s query, the easier for you to know what your customer really needs.
Make sure to have a list of all customer queries and map every customer query that has been resolved during one interaction.
Anticipate possible questions. Train your customer support agents. You can provide guidebooks or answers to frequently asked questions.
Leverage each customer support agent’s assisting technology to quickly resolve the problem.
Review your support channels and gather feedback to have a glimpse at all the problems. Find out why customers always ask for assistance.

Measure and Track Your First Resolution Time With Lido

A happy customer means a lot to every business. A good first resolution time will give you feedback that your customers are happy with your assistance. Measuring first resolution time would be a little bit tedious if you did not automate it, especially when you have a lot of services and customers, but there is an easier way Try Lido to track and summarize your first resolution times. You can sign up here for free.

References

https://www.blendo.co/documents/zendesk-first-resolution-time/

https://www.cxtoday.com/contact-centre/what-is-ftr-first-time-resolution-and-how-do-you-calculate-it/

https://customerthink.com/first-contact-resolution-why-it-matters-and-how-you-can-improve-it/

https://www.wixanswers.com/post/first-call-resolution