Call Center IVRs: 
Has It Really Come Down to This?

As many of you know, I just moved to a new house. So, I've spent lots of time on the phone, making arrangements with my local cable, phone, gas and electric companies.

One of my pet peeves is calling a company and navigating a sometimes nightmarish maze of interactive voice response (IVR) systems. You know, the kind where you have to "Press 1 for this" and "Press 2 for that." Or even worse, systems that ask you to verbally describe the problem, and then tell you their voice recognition software can't understand what you are saying.

Of course you can try pressing zero to speak to a live person. But, sometimes even that doesn't work.

In my frustration, I stumbled across a site called Get Human (www.gethuman.com.) It's an online database of thousands of utility and service companies, along with instructions on how to connect with a live CSR at that particular company.

I don't know much about them. But the mere existence of a company like Get Human suggests that I'm not the only one frustrated by having to navigate several layers of an IVR system, just to get a live person to help me.

That reminds me of a comment in marketing guru Seth Godin's blog where he says, "The only reason to answer the phone when a customer calls is to make the customer happy."

That really hits the nail on the head. Lengthy IVR systems drive customers nuts. I know it's important to direct the call to the right department within a company. But, complicated IVR systems and menu choices just frustrate callers.

Instead, companies should design their IVR tree with no more than four possible prompts per level (i.e. "Press 1, 2, 3 or 4"), and no more than two levels before reaching a CSR. That would increase customer satisfaction and lower call abandon rates.

© 2009 Reflective Keynotes Inc., Mississauga, Canada

Related tips:
This article gives 10 tips for handling irate callers. This related story shows the science of hold music Here is a list of some popular call center training programs.