A customer can receive a correct answer from a polite agent and still leave an interaction without feeling genuinely helped.
The process may have been followed; the information may have been accurate and the conversation respectful from beginning to end. Yet if no one explored what the customer was really trying to achieve, took responsibility for helping, or made the next step clear, the agent may have totally missed the opportunity to create a positive customer experience.
That distinction matters. Customer service is often assessed by what was completed during an interaction. Customer experience, however, is shaped by the customer’s judgement of how easy the interaction was, whether their underlying need was understood and whether they were able to make meaningful progress.
A recent pilot study of 1,000 calls to 20 selected Australian superannuation funds shows how wide the gap between service delivery and customer experience can be. Commissioned by Super Consumers Australia and conducted by CSBA, the study used the CSBA SenseCX quality framework to assess more than 30 observable service behaviours and examine the experience created during each call.
The basics matter, but they are only the beginning
The study found that foundational service behaviours were generally well established. In more than 88% of interactions, frontline agents communicated professionally and respectfully, used appropriate language, introduced themselves and engaged customers through general questioning. These behaviours form the foundation of effective service delivery. Without them, an interaction can quickly become confusing, inconsistent or frustrating.
“More than 88% of calls included the basic behaviours expected of a professional interaction. Yet the higher-value behaviours that create ownership, understanding and closure were rare.”
While many interactions were courteous and professionally delivered, several of the behaviours associated most closely with customers feeling heard, supported, confident and understood were rarely demonstrated. A clear offer of ownership was demonstrated in only 8.1% of calls, effective questioning in 10.8%, and a clear summary at the end of the conversation in 7.2%.
Together, these findings reveal the difference between providing a transactional answer and one that provides genuine assistance and builds satisfaction and trust.
What turns an answer into assistance?
Ownership changes the starting point
Language such as “I can help you with that” signals that the agent will take responsibility for helping the customer move forward. It can also reduce the effort required of the customer to navigate organisational processes and have their enquiry resolved.
Effective questioning improves the value of the response
The first question a customer asks may not reveal everything they are trying to achieve. An agent can answer that question accurately and still miss the underlying need behind it. Purposeful questioning gives the agent the context needed to deliver a more valuable response and shows the customer that they have been heard.
Summarisation makes the outcome clear
A concise closing summary confirms what was discussed, what has been decided and what will happen next. It gives the customer an opportunity to correct any misunderstanding and reduces the likelihood that they will leave the interaction uncertain about the outcome or needing to make contact again. These behaviours are not decorative additions to the core service. They connect the organisation’s information and processes to the customer’s circumstances. They do not require an elaborate script. Their value comes from being used naturally and consistently, and being tailored to the individual customer.
When the customer is left to close the gap
When ownership, effective questioning and summarisation are absent, much of the work remains with the customer. They must determine whether the answer addressed the full issue, identify the gaps and interpret what happens next. In many cases, they will need to make contact again.
From an operational perspective, the interaction may appear successful because a question was answered or a process followed. From the customer’s perspective, it may feel transactional and incomplete. Accuracy, compliance and task completion remain essential, but they provide only part of the picture. They do not establish whether the customer felt understood or knew what to do next.
An organisation can therefore perform strongly against operational measures despite creating interactions that require too much effort from the customer. While politeness may make the experience more pleasant, it does not address the underlying gap.
This is an organisational issue, not an individual one
It would be easy to interpret these findings as evidence that frontline agents need to try harder or communicate better. That would miss the more important point. Customer experience (or lack thereof) is shaped by what the organisation asks employees to prioritise, what its quality framework measures, which behaviours leaders reinforce and how coaching translates those expectations into daily practice.
If success is defined by compliance, accuracy and task completion, these are the behaviours teams will optimise. If quality reviews focus on whether mandatory information was provided, agents will concentrate on providing it. If performance measures reward speed and completion, they will naturally focus on moving efficiently through an interaction. In that environment, polite and process-compliant service becomes the norm while ownership, curiosity and confirmation remain optional.
The absence of higher-value behaviours may indicate more than an individual capability gap. It can also reveal what the organisation has made visible and measurable at the frontline.
Importantly, the study did not assess the policies, procedures or training among individual super funds, nor was it designed to judge individual agent performance. Rather, it reveals the customer experience created by the behaviours observed during the calls. For leaders, the question is not simply whether agents know the correct process, but whether systems, measures and coaching allow the desired customer-focused behaviours to be present, clear and repeatable.
Measure the experience created for the customer
Traditional quality assurance can tell an organisation whether information was accurate, required steps were followed and compliance obligations were met. Those checks remain essential, but a stronger quality framework also examines the experience created for the customer.
That means looking beyond task completion to assess whether the agent:
- took ownership for helping the customer
- explored the customer’s underlying needs
- asked questions that improved the quality of the response
- provided information relevant to the customer’s circumstances
- managed expectations about timing and next steps
- confirmed the outcome and closed the loop.
Broad instructions such as “be more customer focused” or “show more empathy” can be difficult to translate into action. Expectations such as “clarify what the customer is trying to achieve”, “take clear ownership” and “confirm what happens next” give agents specific direction on what behaviours to practice and for leaders, a meaningful set of measures to reinforce.
Politeness is the foundation, not the finish line
Courtesy and professionalism are foundational and non-negotiable. Those foundations alone however, do not create a positive customer experience.
The difference between answering a question and helping a customer is often found in a small number of higher-value behaviours directly within an agent’s control: taking responsibility, understanding what the customer really needs and making the outcome clear. When those behaviours are present, a completed transaction becomes an experience of genuine assistance.
For organisations reviewing their service performance, the leadership challenge is straightforward: are teams being measured on traditional operational metrics or on higher-value collaborative behaviours that translate an interaction into a high-quality customer experience that creates value, trust and loyalty.
About the research
This article draws on the Superannuation Call Centre Experience Report, a pilot customer service quality benchmarking study commissioned by Super Consumers Australia and conducted by CSBA. The study examined 1,000 calls across 20 selected Australia.
