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Create capacity planning scenarios in Connect Customer - Amazon Connect Customer

Create capacity planning scenarios in Connect Customer

A scenario has two parts:

  • Scenario inputs: The maximum occupancy, daily attrition, full-time equivalent (FTE) hours per week. For example, you might enter data that represent your best case scenarios (everyone is at work) or worst case scenarios (a large number of people are out sick during winter months).

  • Optimization inputs: The optimization target for each channel that you want FTE estimates for. Depending on the channel, you can set a service level, average speed of answer (ASA), or average time to complete target. For example, 85% of calls are answered within 30 seconds of entering the queue.

You can then use this scenario to generate a capacity plan that represents how many people you need to hire accordingly to meet your business goals. The output includes the required FTE employees with and without shrinkage, forecasted occupancy rate, the gap between available required FTEs, and maximum overtime (OT) and voluntary time-off (VTO) rate allowed.

To create a capacity planning scenario

  1. Before you can create a capacity plan, you must create and publish a long-term forecast. Connect Customer uses the published long-term forecast as the input for creating the capacity plan. If you haven't yet created a forecast, see Getting started with forecasting.

  2. Log in to the Connect Customer admin website with an account that has security profile permissions for Analytics, Capacity planning - Edit.

    For more information, see Assign permissions.

  3. On the Connect Customer navigation menu, choose Analytics and optimization, Capacity planning.

  4. On the Planning Scenarios tab, choose Create a Scenario.

  5. On the Create scenario page, enter a name and description.

  6. In the Scenario inputs section, enter the following information:

    1. Max Occupancy (optional): The percentage of time agents will spend handling contact volume when they log in.

      1. Daily attrition: The percentage of staff leaving your contact center.

        For example, if the annual attrition is 50%, the daily attrition would be 50%/250 working days per year = 0.2%.

      2. Full-time equivalent (FTE) hours per week: How many hours each FTE employee will work per week.

    2. Outsourced contacts (optional): You can outsource a percentage to a third-party.

    3. Max overtime (OT) allowed (optional): Specify the maximum percent of overtime to plan for peaks. As a planner, you don't want to burn out your workforce.

      For example, you specify 40 as FTE hours per week, with 10 percent maximum overtime. The total work week would be up to 44 hours.

    4. Max voluntary time off (VTO) allowed (optional): Specify the maximum percent of time off to plan for troughs, when there is a lull in contacts and you can save in costs. Be sure not to give too much time off in case traffic increases again.

      For example, you specify 40 as FTE hours per week, with 10 percent maximum time off. The total work week would be at least 36 hours.

    5. Hours of operation: Select the hours of operation that represent when your agents are available to work. This list shows the hours of operation defined in your Connect Customer instance. For more information, see Set the hours of operation and time zone for a queue using Connect Customer.

      You must select an hours of operation to save a scenario. When you select an hours of operation, Connect Customer displays a snapshot of its name, time zone, and weekly hours. Capacity planning uses only the base weekly operating hours, and doesn't include overrides or inherited hours.

      For scenarios that were created before hours of operation became a required input, Connect Customer asks you to select an hours of operation before you can save your changes.

      Note

      The time zone of the selected hours of operation must match the time zone of the plan when you generate it.

      When you generate a plan, Connect Customer saves a snapshot of the selected hours of operation and uses that snapshot for the plan. If you later change the hours of operation in your Connect Customer instance, re-run the plan to use the updated hours.

  7. In the Optimization inputs section, configure an optimization target for each channel that you want FTE estimates for. You can configure one target per channel, for up to four channels: Voice, Chat, Task, and Email. The targets do not have to be the same type. For example, you can use service level for Voice and average time to complete for Task.

    The following image shows the Optimization inputs section with a different target type configured for each channel.

    The Optimization inputs section with a different target type configured for each channel.

    1. Service level: The percentage of contacts answered within a defined target time threshold. Service level is available for all channels.

    2. Average speed of answer (ASA): The average amount of time it takes for contacts to be answered during a specific time period. Average speed of answer is available for the Voice and Chat channels.

    3. Average time to complete: The average amount of time it takes for an agent to complete a contact. Average time to complete is available for the Task and Email channels.

      When you set this target for the Task or Email channel, capacity planning treats the channel as asynchronous. It uses starting backlog projections to estimate headcount. If you set a Service level target for the Task or Email channel instead, capacity planning treats the channel as synchronous. For more information, see Manage starting backlog projections.

    4. To add an optimization target for another channel, choose Add another goal.