We all know that an organisations best asset is its people, therefore it can be so frustrating when you do all of the hard work to get the right people on board for your contact centre, only for them to leave several months into the role.

Off the back of conducting the research for our ‘2019 Salary and Benefits Report’ we have been busy looking at attrition within the contact centre industry in comparison to all other industries and you may or may not be surprised to know that the average attrition rate for the contact centre industry is 26%* with nearly a 3rd of contact centres coming in at between 26% and 50%*. The average attrition rate across all other industries is 15%* so the contact centre industry does have a way to go it seems. A high attrition rate can be extremely damaging to a contact centre, not least because of the actual cost of replacing staff but also because of the negative effects on morale resulting in a poor culture and a ‘domino effect’ i.e. the higher the turnover employees see going on around them, the more likely they themselves will be to look for a new role.

How much is attrition costing your contact centre?

  • Attrition is costing contact centres on average £6125* per agent so based on a 126 seat contact centre, this would be costing the organisation £202’125 per year

(26% turnover rate of 126 agents = 33 (32.76) agents that need to be replaced every year. 33 replacements at the cost of £6,125 each comes to £202,125 per year)

  • If said contact centre was able to bring their attrition rate down to a modest, achievable 15% from 26%, this will bring attrition costs down to £116’375 saving the organisation £85’750

(*statistics sources from Contact Centre Babel)

Benefits of a healthy attrition rate:

It is worth noting that attrition itself isn’t a bad thing and many studies over the years have found that the ideal attrition rate is 10%. I have devised the top 3 benefits of attrition providing it isn’t significantly higher than around the 10% mark:

  • It prevents employee stagnation and leaves room for fresh skills and ideas
  • It can help to phase out poor or dated habits
  • It can actually save time, money and awkward conversations when a poorly performing employee decides to leave of their own accord

What is your organisation doing to combat attrition at the moment and what method have you found has worked the best so far? Comments welcome, lets get the conversation started!