Customer Support Stats: Change question closure stats target to 48 hours

[#1]

http://portal.plus.net/supportpages.html?a=212
With the question close time being consistently over 40 hours isn't it time the target time was changed on the linked page to 48 hours?

[#2]

Errr No!
A class act needs to be got together to achieve the 24 hour target.  Accepting that the target is not being met and pragmatically doubling it (if only because that is what it is) in the long term only makes matters worse.  People's expectations might be better shaped, but managing expectations does not resolve their problems.  All tickets and updates should be responded to (which is not the same as resolution) within 24 hours - period!
If I knew that a ticket would be responded to within 24 hours, I'd not use the call centre for straightforward matters.  A better turnaround on tickets would go a long way to lightening the load on both the call centre and the forum / social medusa channels, both of which are a facet of a failing formal support channel.
I hope Jess is reading this....
Kevin

[#3]

Disappointed that there has been no response from Plusnet on this. They have totally failed to deliver on the promise that things will get better so now they should be setting realistic expectations.

[#4]

Jelv,
May be Jess is searching the help database for a suitable answer... 
Kevin

[#5]

Jess isn't around right at this moment and is really busy focusing on working with the new merging of the teams.
We could change the target time to 48 hours, but what would be the point? I can't see it would add any benefit. We're still wanting to aim at a 24 hour response time, even though we're not hitting that at the moment doesn't mean that our stance/view/targets have to change.
We're absolutely aware that Call Wait Times and Ticket Repose Times aren't as good as they should be, we've been saying that this is the case for quite some time too. We're continuing to work hard and doing everything we can to improve the service we're providing. The merging of Complaints and Digital Care is one of the changes that's taking place in our internal restructure and we're trying to make things better as a whole.
Changes and improvements aren't going to take effect overnight, they take time. We'll continue to aim to where we want to be with Call Wait Time and Ticket Response Times.

[#6]

That is totally inconsistent with what was said when we challenged the changing of the target from 8 hours to 24 hours. See http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,112002.0.html for the topic.

Quote from: Chris

Yes, we changed it towards the end of January when we saw the response times increasing. It was changed to give a more realistic timescale for response and will continue to be reviewed.

On the basis of that the target should be changed because over the last many months you have consistently proved that the 24 hour target can't be achieved.
Now, which is wrong - your reasons for not changing it now or the response we were given in February last year?

[#7]

Hi Jelv,
I understand your questioning of the responses here but the decisions made back then versus decisions made now don't necessarily have to be wrong or right.
The circumstances that drive decisions to make changes in the way we do business are always a key factor and at the time the change was made from 8 to 24 we were having issues meeting the lower response times so this makes sense to set customer expectations by pushing this back to something that we can both operate within and keep it at a realistic response time within our peer group of online service providers.
Now granted, we're having issues at present keeping within the 24 hour response time but making a second change doesn't really look like it will yield any benefits for customer nor company. In addition to this we wouldn't want to to just keep pushing back the response times, before long it will just look like we're moving the goalposts to suit our present situation.
So to summarize, did we make the right choice back in January? The answer is yes, hindsight would suggest that making that change has paid off as we've seen the response time surpass exceeded the 8 hours considerably. Would a change up to 48 hours make sense now? I'm on the fence, right now I don't think it makes sense as we're working to move it in the opposite direction and changing this too often just feels like we're making the job easier.
Bear in mind that the customer can still see the actual response time versus the target throughout it isn't like we're hiding anything from anyone, in fact we're doing quite the opposite and I think it's important to have that visibility.
Ultimately none of this means that it will never be changed if we start to see response times increase however I think it's more important that we focus on pushing that target in the opposite direction for the time being instead of lowering targets.

[#8]

Quote from: Adam

hindsight would suggest that making that change has paid off as we've seen the response time surpass the 8 hours considerably.

Interesting phraseology - Although surpass means 'greater than' or 'exceeds', it's generally used in a positive sense ie it's synonymous with 'excels' or 'better than'

[#9]

Hopefully response times form part of the bonus scheme for the CEO, so consistency failing will mean a reduced bonus, an incentive enough to improve things 
iDan.

[#10]

Adam C
the scenario back then ( 8hrs was changed 24hr, as the response time could not be met  ) is exactly the same as it is now, 24 hour response time has not been met for a long time, so the response time need increasing to be more realistic. until PN can get a proper grip of the situation
I fail to see how this situation is at all different from the last one
Regards
Mike

[#11]

Quote from: pwatson

Interesting phraseology - Although surpass means 'greater than' or 'exceeds', it's generally used in a positive sense ie it's synonymous with 'excels' or 'better than'

Thanks and altered pwatson 

[#12]

@iDan,
Please, lets not go there.  Putting people who do not understand engineering / support on to bonus for call closure targets simply generates the wrong behaviours.  You'll see calls being closed for a multitude of reasons other than they are satisfactorily resolved.
I've got a draw full of tee shirts from such stupid management incentives - we ended up with staff doing nothing other than managing the support stats, rather than dealing with the actual issues.
...this is one reason why the NHS is in such a mess - too much effort placed on measuring (and fudging) targets than looking after people.

@Mike,
Moving the goal posts is accepting defeat - the right action is to get the underlying issues addressed so that the call levels fall.  We all know what those issues are, however I fear the big ones (the other BT divisions) are never going to be addressed whilst the CEO of PN comes from within the BT group.  PN needs to be more aggressive in it management of its suppliers - BTOR / BTw / other equipment / service providers.  Note Kelly has just this afternoon confirmed that the forum performance issues are down to outstanding unresolved issues with the load balancer vendor.  This morning Chris advised that stats reporting was down to a vendor issue.

Quote from: Kelly

We are talking with the LB vendors about this new issue.

Quote from: Chris

The "Currently unavailable" is still being investigating by our third party vendor.

Where an "integrator" service provider (such as PlusNet) does not have a tight grip on the performance of their suppliers, they have little chance of delivering a dependable service to their end users.  Suppliers need to be managed with a firm hand - kid gloves just do not deliver.
Kevin

[#13]

Kevin , it maybe accepting defeat for the time been, but it also about been realistic, the time should be moved to 48 hrs , once PN have got a grip of the situation and the response times are consistently around or less the 24 hr, then move it back down,
Regards
Mike

[#14]

@kevin (Townman)
Couldn't agree with you more.I was being mischievous 

[#15]

Do forgive me! 
There are people around the place who think incentivising people with money is the way to deliver results.  In my experience it just delivers a poorer service.  Doing the right things for the right reasons with pride and honesty is what delivers results.
This is why I think that PN have the right ethos, however they do not have enough of the right skills in the right place to address the ever increasing volume of crud.  You can fire fight for so long, but somewhere along the journey you have to go into fire prevention mode.
You can design fire out of the environment, but that takes time, in the short term you need to employ more fire marshals / watch wardens.  I rather recall saying the same thing on here last October when we were promised that the new provisioning system (due early spring) would address a great multitude of fires.
Then there was the referral payments issue due to be resolved by December 2013.
I'll not go on...
Cheers,
Kevin