A unique model that Rewardsco Contact Centres employs is linking the Quality Department together with Recruitment and Training. This allows for an end to end view of the agent quality from recruitment, through training to on the floor call quality.

The quality observations are fed back into recruitment and training to ensure that the profiles are corrected up front and to ensure that general quality trends are being addressed at the initial training stage.

Rewardsco Contact Centres uses a Quality ratio of 24 agents to 1 QA consultant. This however varies depending on the Quality Assurance requirements of the client. In some cases Rewardsco Contact Centre QA Dept. monitors as few as 30% of the interactions whilst for other clients the requirement is 100%.

Dedicated Quality Assurance (QA) coaches are assigned specific programmes to monitor trends evaluate performance and apply best practices.

Weekly calibration sessions are hosted between operational management, training and QA to identify development areas and create training interventions to address these gaps. The calibration session serves as a holistic approach to meet the programmes / campaigns business objectives. The QA division has acquired strong resource skills with both domestic and UK experience.

Trisha Reddy our Senior QA officer won both the regional and national BPeSA award for best Quality Assurance professional in South Africa. She will attend the International EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Asia) awards to be held in London next year.

Each consultant is coached and assessed on a daily basis. We are continuously strengthening our alignment with international and national best practices / standards.

Quality Assurance Process:

The role of the quality assurance team is to objectives of the Q.A function, but not limited to are:

• To ensure consistent methods of assessment at all times
• To educate consultants on QA methods
• To ensure that the right to privacy is not infringed upon
• To ensure the fairness of all methods of assessment used
• To provide relevant feedback to all relevant parties
• To determine training needs
• To assist in maintaining standards of quality

Frequency:

Assessments are conducted daily on each agent.  One assessment must consist of at least two voice calls.  Although Team Leaders will conduct the necessary two assessments, they will not be limited in the number of interventions that they may have with the agents. 

Supervisors may ask for an assessment to be conducted on an agent at any time, if the need arises. Feedback should is conducted no later than 2 working days after an assessment is complete.

Results are used for the purposes of Quality Assurance, which may include but are not limited to training needs analyses and staff appraisals.  These results are confidential and agents are briefed and have controlled access to the outcomes of assessments.

In order to ensure that our customers have the ultimate customer experience during any interaction with our call centre via all communication channels, agents are assessed against pre-defined criteria to evaluate their soft skills and product knowledge.

Assessment Guidelines:

All assessments and assessment tools used in Quality Assurance comply with the following criteria:

• Reliable – Different assessors should be able to reach the same result each time the assessment is conducted under the same circumstances
• Validity  – It must assess the proficiency or competence as required
• Fair – It must be clear and free from obscure terminology or terms.
• Useful – It must measure skills and knowledge which are meaningful. The results must be easily utilised to make skills development more effective

Coaching/Training:

The Quality Assurance Coach will communicate all training needs to the Training Department as needs arise.  On the job coaching will be conveyed to the Supervisors.

Training may be requested should the Team Leader or the QA Coach, in consultation with the agent, find that it is necessary.  All training results will be recorded by the trainer and will be made available to the consultant concerned as well as the Supervisor and the QA coach.