Waiting-call selection based on anticipated wait times

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD [Detailed description of the invention]

【0001】

[Technical field to which the invention belongs]

The present invention relates to a queue configuration for a telephone call answering center, an automatic call distribution system, and the like.

【0002】

[Conventional technology]

In an automatic call distribution (ACD) system, calls arriving at a call center are answered and handled by multiple agents. The ACD system automatically distributes and connects incoming calls to agents who are appropriate to handle the call and are free (ie, not handling other calls at that time). [0003]

It is often the case that the appropriate agent is not available when the call center is overloaded by the call and the call arrives. Then, these calls move to the waiting state. These calls are placed in several queues based on predetermined criteria, and are placed in each queue in the order of arrival or priority. Here, these calls wait for the appropriate agent to become free and serviceable. These wait calls are distributed to each agent and handled on an oldest-call-waiting (OCW) basis. That is, when an agent becomes available, the system selects the call that has been waiting the longest for the first call in each queue, taking into account whether the agent is eligible to handle that call. If a call is not picked up at this time, the system does not consider how long it must wait before the next available agent.

【0004】

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention]

An object of the present invention is to provide an excellent queue configuration applicable to a telephone call answering center, an automatic call distribution system, and the like.

【0005】

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention is as described in the claims. The additional latency experienced by unselected calls causes the ACD system customer (callee) to experience the drawback of annoying the caller and abandoning the call. It also reduces the average total response time of responses to calls, mitigating the above drawbacks by selecting the call that is expected to wait the longest if not selected for a newly available agent. be able to. For example, if the call queue corresponding to a major large skill possessed by many agents has a current elapsed time of 1 minute and a call service time of 10 seconds, the total expected latency will be the oldest call in the queue. On the other hand, it is 70 seconds. If the call queue for a small skill dedicated to a small number of agents has a current elapsed time of 50 seconds and a call service time of 25 seconds (because only a small number of agents have skills), then the total expected wait time is awaited. 75 seconds for the oldest call in the queue. According to the present invention, calls from the queue corresponding to the dedicated skill are selected for available agents with both skills, even if the oldest queue is currently in the queue corresponding to the main skill. To. Such call distribution not only reduces the average overall response time, but also improves service to calls of types that can be handled by fewer agents or that require longer talk times (those with low call service rates). be able to.

【0006】

The present invention provides a method and device for selecting one of a plurality of items (units, eg, calls) awaiting selection. This method predicts how long it will take for each item among the multiple items waiting to be selected to be selected if that item is not the first of the multiple items waiting to be selected, and the longest. It has a step of first selecting one of a plurality of items waiting to be selected for which the waiting time is predicted. These steps are preferably repeated until only one of the plurality of items remains awaiting selection. The apparatus of the present invention also carries out the method of the present invention. The device has an execution means (any entity that executes the corresponding step) for each step. The invention can also be provided by a computer-readable medium containing the software, which, when executed in the computer, causes the computer to perform the steps of the method of the invention.

【0007】

If the plurality of waiting items are communications waiting for processing (for example, handling of an agent), the present invention shows how long it takes for each of the plurality of communications waiting for processing to be processed. It has a step of predicting whether to wait if the communication is not processed first among the waiting communications, and processes one of the waiting communications with the longest predicted latency first. Have a step to do.

【0008】

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

FIG. 1 shows a call center consisting of automatic call distribution exchanges 10 that serve a plurality of agent stations 11 in which the agent 25 is engaged, at least in part. The automatic call distribution exchange 10 is connected to a plurality of trunks 12 that receive incoming calls. The automatic call distribution exchange 10 distributes and connects these calls to the agent station 11 of the agent 25 based on a predetermined group of criteria. The agent processes the calls sent to it by the automatic call distribution switch 10. The call center shown in FIG. 1 is the subscriber location device described in US Pat. No. 5,206,903.

【0009】

The automatic call distribution exchange 10 is serviced by a pair of a call management system 13 and a voice information system 14. The call management system 13 has call accounting (billing, etc.), reporting, and management functions, and the voice information system 14 has a vocalization function. Both the call management system 13 and the voice information system 14 are of the prior art. As an example, call management system 13 is Lucent Technologies CMS and voice information system (VIS) 14 is Lucent Technologies Conversant®. As in the prior art, the automatic call distribution exchange 10 has a memory 15 consisting of one or more different memory units that store programs and data, and a processor 16 that executes the stored programs and uses the stored data in execution. And have. This memory contains a plurality of groups 20 of call queues 21. Each of the 20 groups in this call queue 21 conventionally services and holds calls to different splits or skill groups of agents. In each of the 20 groups of call queues 21, each queue 21 holds calls of different priority.

【0010】

Alternatively, each group 20 may consist of only one call queue 21 such that calls of different priorities are queued in the order of their priorities. For example, different priorities are given to calls by known methods with some predetermined criteria such as whether the caller is a stranger, a regular account holder, or a preferential customer. assign. Each call queue 21 acts as a FIFO buffer memory, each having multiple entries (ie, position 23) to identify calls placed in the corresponding queue. The head position 23 of the call queue 21 is considered to be position number 1, the next subsequent position 23 in the call queue 21 is considered to be position number 2, and so on.

【0011】

The memory 15 further has a predicted latency (EWT) function 22. As the name implies, this feature determines how long a call placed in call queue 21 must wait before being connected to agent station 11. This prediction is obtained separately by the EWT function 22 for each queue 21 in each group 20. This is based on the average service rate at which calls proceed through call position 23, which corresponds to call queue 21. This rate of advance is calculated by the EWT function 22. U.S. Pat. No. 5,056898 provides a practical example of EWT function 22.

【0012】

The memory 15 further has a call selection function 24. The call selection function 24 determines for each call at the beginning of the call queue 21 how long the call stayed in the queue (current wait time of the call: PWT), and For each of the available agents 25, the call selection function 24 is prior art in that it selects a call from the call queue 21 for connection with the agent 25 and handling by the agent 25. However, according to the present invention, the call selection function 24 does not select a call based on the oldest call waiting criterion, and when the agent 25 becomes available, the call selection function 24 activates the agent. Consider the first call in each of the queues 21 out of which 25 can handle calls, and the call with the highest priority of the calls, which would have to wait the longest if not selected at this time. Select. The function of the call selection function 24 is shown in the flow chart of FIG.

【0013】

In step 200 of FIG. 2, the execution of the call selection function 24 is called each time the agent 25 becomes available to handle the call. In response, in step 202, the call selection function 24 determines (determines) the skill to which the agent 25 is assigned from the agent's stored profile. The call selection function 24 then determines the highest priority call of any call waiting for any determined skill. For each agent skill, the call selection function 24 selects the corresponding group 20 of the call queue 21 and determines the highest priority call queue in group 20 containing at least one call. The predicted wait time function 22 then selects the determined call queue 21 having the highest priority and calculates the predicted wait time for the selected queue 21 as follows.

【0014】

For each first call in the determined highest priority call queue 21, in step 206, the call selection function 24 determines, by method of the art, how long the call stayed in the queue. To do. For each of these calls, in step 208, the call selection function 24 obtains the average service rate of the calls in the corresponding call queue 21 from the predicted waiting time function 22. In step 210, the call selection function 24 adds two values for each of the calls obtained in steps 206 and 208 to calculate the predicted waiting time for each call. Alternatively, the average service rate may be adjusted prior to the addition. This subtracts half of the time since the last call left the corresponding call queue from the average service rate, and the result or the 25% greater of the unadjusted average service rate is the current wait time. It can be executed by adding and so on. Next, the call selection function 24 compares the calculated predicted waiting time with each other in step 212, selects the call having the longest predicted waiting time, and in step 216, the agent 25 enabled in step 200. Assign the selected call to. Next, in step 218, the call selection function 24 ends execution until the agent 25 becomes available again.

【0015】

The present invention allows many modifications other than the examples shown. As an example, the same algorithm can be used to determine which agent will take the next incoming call if there are not enough calls to make the agent busy and the agent can be queued. The SEL function may also be performed by an attached processor, which is connected to and controlled by an ACD switch via computer telephony integration (CTI). Moreover, the invention is not limited to distributing real-time calls. As an example, it can also be applied to queuing and distribution of stored requests sent or placed by the requester (email, voice mail, facsimile, video / voice recording, multimedia messages, etc.). The concept of AWT routing can also be applied to workflow applications such as routing work items between people or stations that can accomplish the following of the entire work. Such changes and modifications can be made without departing from the claims of the present invention.

【0016】

[Effect of the invention]

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to provide an excellent queue configuration applicable to a telephone call answering center, an automatic call distribution system, and the like.

[Simple explanation of drawings]

[Figure 1]

It is a block diagram of a call center including the Example of this invention.

[Figure 2]

It is a flow chart which shows the operation of the SEL function of the call center of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 Automatic Call Distribution (ASD) Exchange 11 Agent station 12 trunk 13 Call Management System (CMS) 14 Voice Information System (VIS) 15 memory 16 processor 20 call queue group 21 Call queue 22 Predicted waiting time function 23 position 24 Call selection function 25 agents 200 agents available 202 Determine agent skills 204 Determine the highest priority call queue for all determined skills 206 Determines the current wait time for a call at the beginning of each call queue with the highest priority determined. 208 Determine the average progress rate for each call queue with the highest priority determined 210 Predicted wait time (= current wait time + average progress rate) for each call queue with the highest priority 212 Select a call from the beginning of the call queue with the longest predicted latency 216 Assign selected calls to available agents 218 End