1. U.S. General Services Administration USA.gov Contact Center Case Study: JD Power Assessment & Customer Satisfaction Results Mary Ann Monroe Director, Contact Center Services Office of Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies

2. Overview of Presentation GSA/JD Power and Associates collaboration Rationale Goals Results Moments of truth Lessons learned Questions and Answers

3. USA.gov Contact Center Respond to the public inquiries about government information, programs & services; provide contact center services to customer agencies Web site: USA.gov & GobiernoUSA.gov Channels: Telephone, Email, Web Chat - English/Spanish Self Service: Answers.USA.gov/Respuestas.USA.gov Volume FY13: 600,000 inquiries, 6.5 million FAQ hits

4. GSA/JD Power Collaboration Rationale Operational Performance Assessment (OPA) Comprehensive analysis of contact center operations to determine areas of strength and opportunity Use results to inform our strategic direction Customer Satisfaction (CSat) Surveys Understand customer satisfaction drivers across channels Identify areas of impact and improvement on customer experiences Validate our current knowledge in an effort to create a customer driven culture

5. Results - Strengths Leadership - Committed, Engaged Staff - Highly skilled, dedicated, high retention Employee Engagement - Input sought, incorporated Quality Assurance - Consistent, engaged staff, solid process CSat - Collected post interaction, customer verbatims communicated Technology - Robust Key Performance Indicators - Balanced Practices - Custom responses vs. scripts

6. Results - Areas of Opportunity Marketing and Branding Expectations need to be established early and often Insight into Customer Improve understanding of customer Customer identification by channel Customer Satisfaction/Voice of Customer Provide more actionable data Correlate results to Information Specialist & interaction Measure “overall satisfaction” consistently on all channels Increase survey sample size - telephone interactions

7. Call us at 1 (800) FED INFO (333-4636) – Our information specialists will answer your government questions between 8:00 AM and 8:00 PM Eastern Time, Monday through Friday, except federal holidays. If you have a question about federal agencies, programs, benefits, or services, the National Contact Center is only a phone call away.

8. Results - Areas of Opportunity Cont. Define First Contact Resolution (Key Performance Indicator) Quality Assurance Take it to next level Include “superior” performance & examples Increase call/screen recording Adjust Supv. time to increase coaching on superior performance & examples Ensure partnership and alignment between GSA and Contractor

9. Results - Areas of Opportunity Cont. Execution on Contacts Set expectations - tell customer what you can/can’t do and why Use information collected from customer or don’t collect - created poor perception of timeliness Timeliness - execute email as quickly as possible, help customer understand what follow-up is coming Personalize responses whenever possible (use first name, location, etc.)

10. Results - Areas of Opportunity Cont. IVR Simplify options, descriptions, and limit “the tree” as much as possible Reduce number of recorded messages Key Performance Indicators First Contact Resolution

12. Tackling the Results 1.Owned the results 2.Created Action Plan 3.Categorized Actions and Developed Milestones Assigned ownership: GSA & Contractor Categories: Operational (Quality, Training), Communication, Branding, IVR Timeframe: Long Term, Short Term, Specific Dates 4. Developed metrics to define success, measure improvements

13. Actions - GSA Define USA.gov brand Web site, Contact Center & Information Specialists Set realistic expectations for the customer Define customer centric culture we aim to achieve Define & measure FCR KPI Improve CSat surveys & process Improve IVR Add Customer Relationship Management

14. Actions - Contractor Coach, Train Information Specialists Communication/Execution Empathy, personalization Contact management Shape expectations Develop Interaction Models Set standards for excellence

15. Results – E-mail/Web Chat Satisfaction Scores 2014E-mailWeb Chat January/February56.35%83.6% March/April62.3%93.4% Percentage of survey respondents who answered “Excellent” or “Very good” to “How do you rate the quality of the services we provide?”

16. Industry Best Practices First Call Resolution – Moment of Truth 90%+ in certified call centers Crucial driver in overall satisfaction Empower/engage your staff to define most common calls Create internal best practices and ‘living’ knowledge base to draw from Satisfaction drops nearly 30% if Specialist does not have all the information available

17. Industry Best Practices Set expectations around ability to solve problems Empower Specialists to solve more problems Be personal and reduce the Level of Effort Greet warmly, use opportunity to educate callers about other service channels Follow-up, if applicable

18. Call to Action 1.Don’t be afraid to take a hard look at your program Review your interaction models Review your IVR tree 2.Set clear expectations for customers 3.Align & deliver services that meet the needs & expectations of your customer 4.Use results to improve and transform service delivery & customer experiences 5.Make interactions easy, enjoyable, efficient

19. Contact Information 202 – 579 - 5127 @MonroeMaryann MaryAnn Monroe maryann.monroe@gsa.gov