Agent collision happens when multiple customer service agents respond to the same ticket at once, causing confusion for the customer and inefficiency for the organization. Or, in another scenario, the agent to submit a reply first “wins,” and the other doesn’t realize they’re typing in vain until they try to submit and get an error message.
A zealous customer service organization is a good thing. The more quickly and enthusiastically you respond to customers’ questions and complaints, the better your brand’s reputation and the higher your customer advocacy. But in the race to serve customers quickly, agent collision is often an unfortunate side effect. Without mechanisms to prevent it, agent collision can undermine the effectiveness of your customer service organization.
Why Does Agent Collision Matter to Customer Service?
Customers want to feel taken care of. Quick response reassures them your brand has the answers and that you care. But when two different agents respond to a customer’s question at once, it sends a message that your organization is not all that organized. Their trust breached, the customer wonders what else you’re bad at.
At the same time, any customer service organization strives to be as efficient as possible and to optimize the time of support agents. When two agents are tackling the same problem, one of them is wasting time — time that could be spent helping another customer.
Even if your customer support software prevents two different agents from replying to a customer query, unless they’re blocked from even trying, they can still waste their time. That’s why the key to preventing agent collision is a customer service platform with built-in prevention mechanisms. This does not mean two agents cannot work together on a customer service issue. But only one must have ownership at a time.
How Helpshift Prevents Agent Collision
The Helpshift backend is designed to prevent agent collision. Within the Helpshift dashboard, every ticket must be claimed by an agent before it’s attended to.
Helpshift also enables you to avoid agent collision during the processing of bulk actions. A yellow indicator in the corner of the issue you are editing will alert you to a possible agent collision.
Not every customer service platform makes agent collision preventable, so make sure you find one that does.
Additional information About Agent Collision
- Article: What happens if I apply a Bulk Action to an Issue that another Agent is viewing?
- Helpshift Product: Ticketing and Support
- Helpshift Product: Case Management