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Scenario 1: Two or more agents available to take an interaction

This scenario describes what happens when many agents are available to take an incoming interaction that arrives in the ACD queue.

Step 1: An interaction arrives

Each time an interaction arrives in Customer Interaction Center, it is evaluated and routed to the appropriate queue. Possible queues are user queues, workgroup queues, station queues, and ACD queues. CIC flags any interaction sent to an ACD queue for ACD processing. This processing includes assigning skill requirements and priority levels to the interaction.

Step 2: A list of available agents is generated

In most ACD configurations, every activated agent that has an Available status and is not already engaged in an interaction is added to the list of agents that could answer the interaction. This processing is a bit different in ACD configurations that use the Percent Agent Utilization feature. A description of that feature appears later in this document. When Percent Agent Utilization is in use, the list of available agents consists of every agent with a status of Available who is under 100% utilization. You can also route a specific interaction type to an agent. For more information, see Route a Specific Interaction Type to an Agent in the ACD Server Parameters section of this document.

Step 3: The agent list is filtered

In step 1, the interaction is assigned minimum skill requirements. The list of available agents is filtered by removing any agents who do not have the minimum skill requirements to handle the interaction. For example, if the interaction requires an agent with a Spanish skill of at least 50 and a UNIX skill of 35, then available agents who do not meet those requirements are removed from the list. The only agents left on the list are ones that are qualified to answer the interaction. If there are no qualified agents left on the list, the interaction waits until an agent becomes available (see "Scenario 2: Many interactions that need to be answered, and an agent becomes available").

Step 4: Agent scores are calculated

Now Customer Interaction Center calculates a score for each agent in the list using the agent score formula. You can configure the agent score formula by modifying values for the following attributes:

  • Agent skill proficiency, from 1 to 100 (configured in the Interaction Administrator)

  • Agent cost (configured in the Interaction Administrator)

  • Time an agent has been available (configured in the ACD Process Item tool)

  • Any three custom attributes (configured in the Interaction Administrator and the ACD Process Item tool)

  • Weight for utilization (configured in the ACD Process Item tool)

You decide whether to weight the selection toward an agent’s skill proficiency, cost, the length of time an agent has been available, or any combination of the three. You can also define your own attributes and use them in determining an agent’s score.

For more information about configuring the agent score formula, see Configuring Customer Interaction Center’s ACD Processing.

Step 5: The most appropriate agent is selected

ACD selects the agent with the highest score to receive the interaction. If two agents have the same score, the agent who has been available longest receives the interaction.