The SenseCX Best Practice Quality Assurance Aged Care Sector Benchmark Report, released by customer experience specialist CSBA, highlights key traits of top-performing customer contact centers.
Despite the sector’s strong overall performance, CSBA account director Tony Williams said while it was encouraging to see the aged care provider phone centre staff his organisation evaluated outperform most sectors, there are still areas requiring improvement.
ASKING EFFECTIVE questions, taking ownership of the customer’s enquiry and acting upon the customer’s unique cues are the traits of the top performing customer contact centres.
That’s according to the SenseCX Best Practice Quality Assurance Aged Care Sector Benchmark Report from customer experience specialist CSBA.
The aged care sector’s overall performance ranks in the top half of the nine sectors evaluated. But there are several key areas of customer service requiring improvement, says CSBA account director Tony Williams.
“It’s very encouraging to see aged care provider phone centre staff we evaluated outperform most sectors,” Williams tells Australian Ageing Agenda.
“That said, there’s certainly ample room for providers to make it easier for customers to interact. Staff need to put customers at ease by demonstrating stronger ownership of issues. Simply saying ‘I’ll be able to help you with that right now’ immediately reassures customers and builds confidence and trust that they’ll be looked after,” he says.
Rankings are based on 13,348 assessments of 244 organisations conducted between 1st July 2023 and 30th June 2024. This includes 160 assessments of eight aged care organisations. Those making the top five – in order – are:
- BlueCare
- Bethanie
- Bolton Clarke
- Calvary
- St Vincent’s Care.
The other providers assessed – in alphabetical order – are Anglicare, Arcare Aged Care and Regis Aged Care.
On areas needing improvement, Williams says aged care phone centre staff can do better at anticipating customers’ needs and proactively offering information.
“For example, providing advice and information that customers didn’t ask for but is nevertheless useful can really influence the customer’s experience,” he says.
Staff also need to make customers feel more positive about the interaction.
“Experiences which feel personal, caring and understanding are vital in the aged care sector, but few providers’ contact centre teams do this well… It’s essential to build instant rapport and simply using the customer’s name is an excellent way to build a relationship,” says Williams.
“Another important area call handlers need to improve is managing customers’ expectations. They need to give their full attention, listen actively, and confirm their understanding of what the customer needs. Staff need to be prepared to address uncertainties around things like timescales by providing honest reasons to customers.”
Concluding calls is a big area in need of a boost for aged care staff – who perform below every other sector CSBA evaluates.
“Providing clear summaries back to customers, checking their understanding and ensuring they can ask any additional questions are important to get right,” says Williams.
Under-investing in customer service is incredibly short- sighted, says Williams. “Managing customer experiences demands targeted frontline training backed up with monitoring to ensure agents consistently demonstrate behaviours that will drive excellent customer service.”
Source – As published in the July-August edition of Australian Ageing Agenda
