Call center evaluation form.

As a business owner, you may be hesitant about signing on with an answering service. On the one hand, you need help ensuring that every phone call you receive is answered. But on the other hand, you don’t really know who is answering your phones and how well they will represent your brand. That’s why it is so important that the service you choose offers the capability to listen to call recordings, and then of course, that you take the time to listen!

Evaluating recordings allows you to monitor operator performance and assess your script for call flow. To make the evaluation process effortless, we’ve created a call center evaluation spreadsheet so you can score operator performance. It’s a great tool if you are comparing answering services side by side over a free trial period.

Here are a few things to listen for when replaying your calls.

• Were the operators friendly, enthusiastic and helpful? Answering service operators may be the first contact a caller has with your business. The caller’s experience should be as effortless as possible.
• Was your business name pronounced correctly? During programming, phonetic spelling can be added to the account, making it easy for operators to properly communicate your business name. Often, the business name can also be included in the upfront recording.
• Were the operators knowledgeable about your business? If it doesn’t seem like the operators know enough about your business, teach them. Add more FAQs to your account.
• How well did the script seem to flow? Did you notice times when the operators may have gotten stuck on a confusing question? Are there things you could add to cover the main reasons people contact your business? Work on adding new paths to your script to address almost any query your callers may have.
• Did the operators follow instructions? If part of your script involves operators transferring calls to you directly or contacting on-call personnel for urgent matters, then you’ll want to be certain the service is hitting the mark. When a call is transferred, ask yourself if operators are taking down all of the information you need to assist customers.