Interaction distribution

To ensure fair distribution of work among agents, VCC counts the time from the agent’s last interaction (call, email, chat) to route the next one to the longest waiting agent. This applies to all agents, including those who receive inbound calls, perform warm transfers, and to personal calls.

Examples
Scenario A:

1. Agents are queued in the waiting room.

2. An inbound call is routed to the agent at the top of the queue.

3. The call goes live and ends.

4. The agent is now placed at the bottom of the queue in the waiting room.

Scenario B:

1. Agents are queued in the waiting room.

2. An inbound call is directed to Agent A at the top of the queue.

3. The call is live.

4. Agent A performs a warm transfer to Agent B and drops from the call.

5. As in Scenario A, the agent is now placed at the bottom of the queue in the waiting room.

6. Agent B drops from the transferred call and is placed at the bottom of the queue.

Equal call distribution

Equal call distribution is a type of skills-based routing.
With skills-based routing, if two agents have identical skills, the agent with the longest wait time gets the interaction. Using equal call distribution, VCC distributes interactions more equally between the available agents.

Equal call distribution is ideal for outbound contact centers. In an outbound contact center, agents might perceive inbound interactions as being more valuable than outbound calls. Without equal call distribution, agents making the most outbound calls may miss out on these inbound interactions. With equal call distribution, VCC allocates inbound interactions more fairly.

If equal call distribution is enabled for your account, the following call distribution methods are available:

• Time since answering last inbound call (descending). VCC selects the agent who has been the longest without an inbound call and is available to answer.

  • The time since an agent's last inbound interaction is never reset. So, when an agent logs in, their last inbound interaction from when they were last logged in applies. If an agent logs out for a significant period of time — for example, if the agent goes on holiday — VCC is quite likely to route the next inbound interaction to them when they next log in as their last inbound interaction will be longest ago.
  • When you create a new agent, the time since the agent's last inbound interaction is set to the time of agent creation. As a result, the agent will have to wait until all other agents have received an inbound interaction before VCC routes an inbound interaction to them.

• Time since handling last interaction or changing presence (descending). This method is the default method of call distribution and works the same as if equal call distribution is not enabled for your account. If two agents have identical skills, the agent who handled an interaction or changed their presence longest ago gets the interaction. If you don't want to use equal call distribution, use this method.

  In this context:

  • The agent finishes 'handing an interaction' when the conversation between the agent and customer ends.
  • An agent 'changes their presence' when they:
    • Log in to VCC
    • Go into a Ready state from any other presence state. Any other presence changes are not included.

• Time since handling last interaction (descending). If two agents have identical skills, the agent who handled an interaction the longest ago, gets the interaction.

  In this context, the agent finishes 'handing an interaction' when the conversation between the agent and customer ends.

• Random Agent. With random call distribution, VCC allocates the interactions on a random basis to available agents.

For information about setting up equal call distribution, see /wiki/spaces/PD/pages/180322347.