What is an abandoned call?
An abandoned call is a call or other type of contact initiated to a call center or contact center that is ended before any conversation occurs. When inbound calls are abandoned, it is often because the caller is frustrated with the time spent on hold.
When outbound calls are abandoned, it is usually because the call is disconnected by the automated dialer or automatic call distributor (ACD) when live contact has been made but no agent was available to take the call. A predictive dialer can eliminate the problem of abandoned outbound calls.
An abandoned call might also be referred to as an abandoned contact. Let's look at some metrics to better understand abandoned calls.
Abandoned call rates
The abandoned call rate is the ratio between the number of calls terminated before they could be answered and the total number of calls. This is important for key performance indicators (KPIs) that demonstrate customer satisfaction and service level. A high abandonment rate is often used as a signal by contact centers to improve the response time.
In this calculation, the term abandoned calls includes missed calls and dropped calls. Missed calls refer to calls that couldn't be answered because the ACD was occupied, whereas dropped calls refer to calls that were disconnected due to technical issues.
Abandon time
Abandon time refers to the amount of time taken to disconnect or terminate the call before it could be answered. This can happen at one of the following stages:
- Interactive voice response. The caller is hearing an autogenerated voice with the IVR options for continuing the call.
- Call queue. The caller is told their number in the queue. This can be used by the caller to anticipate the amount of time it will take to talk to an agent.
- Wait queue. The caller is waiting in the queue to be connected to an agent.
- Ringing. The caller is at the front of the queue and is waiting for an agent to answer.
- Voicemail. The caller is hearing a voicemail recording rather than talking to an agent.
Abandoned call vs. missed call vs. lost call
As noted, an abandoned call is initiated by a customer who usually grows impatient with the wait time and hangs up the phone before the call can be answered.
A missed call reaches the contact center, but for some reason is not answered by a contact center agent. For example, the call reaches the maximum wait time in the queue and is disconnected by a contact center agent.
A lost call is one that does not reach the contact center. This might be the result of a technical error or not enough available lines to handle the number of incoming calls.
Tips for reducing abandoned call rate
There are several ways to reduce the abandoned call rate, including the following:
- Reduce the waiting time by increasing the number of agents in the contact center.
- If the wait time is long, give callers an option to call back at a later time.
- If the queue is long, give callers an option to submit their phone numbers and request a call back later.
- Experiment with your welcome message to find the one with the lowest abandoned call rate.
Editor's note: This article was updated to include the latest information on call centers and contact centers.
