Service levels, queues and workload measures
Calculate and read the everyday measures of a service team (service level, average speed of answer, abandon rate, handling time, first-contact resolution, occupancy, backlog age), state the denominator every time, and use the numbers without letting them push out quality. For team leads and senior agents; figures are fictional and no industry benchmarks are implied.
- Level
- Intermediate
- Length
- About 50 minutes
- Contents
- 3 lessons · 1 video · final exam
- Status
- Published · updated 1 Oct 2026
Skills you'll practise
- Calculate service level, average speed of answer and abandon rate from queue data, stating the denominator used
- Calculate average handling time and occupancy from their components
- Calculate first-contact resolution from a stated definition and explain how the definition changes the result
- Prioritize a backlog by age against the target and explain what the oldest items say about the queue
- Recognize when a measure is driving the wrong behaviour and propose a balancing measure
Course outline
- 1.Service levels, queues and workload measuresVideo · 3 min
- 2.Queue measures: service level, speed of answer, abandonmentLesson · 17 min
- 3.Handling time, occupancy and first-contact resolutionLesson · 17 min
- 4.Backlogs and measures that misbehaveLesson · 16 min
- 5.Service levels, queues and workload measures: knowledge checkKnowledge check · 16 questions
- 6.Final exam8 questions · passing it completes the course, so people who already know the material can test out
Sources it draws on
The lessons and questions are written from these references, so learners can go back to the original.
- ISO 18295-1:2017 Customer contact centres: Part 1: Requirements for customer contact centres
- General customer service and field service practice (starter content; needs subject review)
See it with your own jobs and topics
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