A v a y a B u s i n e s s A d v o c a t e :

Predictive and Adaptive

Techniques for contact centers

White Paper
December 2002

Converged Voice and

Data Networks
Customer Relationship
Management
Unified Communication
Supported by:
Avaya Labs and Services

Avaya Business Advocate1 provides predictive and adaptive techniques that help a contact center achieve its
goals in terms of both efficiency and effectiveness. The first of these techniques, Expected Wait Time (EWT) 2,
was introduced in 1996. The full scope of Avaya Business Advocate goes well beyond simply calculating EWT.
As other vendors in the marketplace have begun to make claims in this area, it is important to note the scope
and depth of value that Avaya Business Advocate brings to a contact centers operations.
Contact centers that segment calls according to needs or urgency or complexity have special issues that
Avaya Business Advocate addressesallowing the center to assign multiple skills to agents while ensuring
that each resource is used to create the maximum benefit possible. A multi-skilled agent can maintain
higher productivity and lower cost per call than a single-skilled agent because there are more ways for the
multi-skilled agent to be of use in the center, but poor decision making on how to use the agent can lead to
poor center performance and loss of revenues. Decision making at the point in time that each resource is
assigned a call is a focus of Avaya Business Advocate.
Avaya Business Advocate provides predictive and adaptive techniques that govern the assignment of
agents to calls in an Avaya DEFINITY call center. Whether the contact center is hardly busy, at normal
operations, or heavily loaded with calls, each call is served as a result of assigning it to an agent. Features
most often used by Avaya Business Advocate customers are:
Predicted Wait Time: A calculations of a callers wait time that combines both the historical and the
predictive, adding the amount of time the call has already waited to the amount of time the caller is
anticipated to continue waiting if the agent that is currently available serves, not this call, but another
call. The amount of time the caller is anticipated to continue waiting is called the Advance Time, and is
an important element in detecting which calls might bear a large time penalty if they must wait for the
next qualified agent to become available. Predicted Wait Times are calculated for the calls at the head
of the queues that correspond to the skills of an agent who just has became available.
Service Objective: An administered parameter that helps to calibrate the level of service each type of
call (skill) receives. Each skills Service Objective, in relation to the others, can make a skill either more
urgent, or less urgent to serve. For example, a Service Objective of 20 seconds for a Sales call and 40
seconds for a Service call mean that a 20-second wait for a Sales call is as good (or as bad) as a 40second wait for a Service call.
Call Selection performed using Predicted Wait Time and Service Objective allows Avaya Business
Advocate to keep caller wait times at the right level, helping to avoid long waits while adapting the
selection of work for any particular agent to the future work assignments that are likely to be made in the
next several seconds as other agents become available. Resource types that are scarce, either momentarily
or for longer periods of time, are perceived through the Predicted Wait Time calculation, and the problems
that resource scarcity cause can be minimized with these techniques for call selection.

Avaya Business Advocate was formerly known as CentreVu Advocate software

The Expected Wait Time calculation used within Avaya Business Advocate was developed by Bell Laboratories and first available on the
DEFINITY Release 4 in 1996. EWT was the first predictive calculation of its kind in the market place.

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Overload Thresholds: Wait time thresholds administered for each skill designate the maximum wait
time experience the center will permit before trying to minimize caller wait time by making additional
agents eligible to handle that type of call. Up to two Overload Thresholds can be administered for
each skill. Every time a call enters the queue, the callers Expected Wait Time (EWT) is compared to
the threshold. The Expected Wait Time would be a calculation of how long the callers total wait will
be. If the callers EWT exceeds the threshold, the skill goes into an Overload condition. While the skill
is in the Overload condition, agents designated as Reserves for that Overload condition become
eligible to take that kind of call. In addition to the EWT trigger to make Reserve agents eligible, the
current wait time of the head call in queue can also trigger Reserve agent eligibility.
Reserve Agents: Agents can be designated as Primary or Reserve for each skill administered for the
agent. A Primary skill is one that the agent will serve on a routine basis. A Reserve skill is one that the
agent will serve only when the skill is in the appropriate level of Overload condition. There are two
levels of Reserve agents (Reserve 1 and Reserve 2), corresponding to the two Overload Thresholds.
Reserve agents, when handling a Reserve skill call, will take the head call from the same queue that
their Primary agent counterparts serve, maintaining the first-in, first-out (FIFO) order for calls of that
type and eliminating the need for overflow queues to create access to more resources.
Occupancy Calculation: A calculation of the occupancy for each available agent helps Avaya Business
Advocate to discern which agents have been carrying a greater workload.
Least Occupied Agent Selection3: Selecting among available agents according to the least occupied
helps to raise the productivity of the agents who have worked the least, while providing more
available time to the agents who have work the most and who, possibly, have been overworked.
Occupancy as a factor in agent selection helps to reduce the hot seat problem for agents with
multiple skills. Creating more available time, even briefly, for agents with multiple skills also helps to
improve the service level of the more specialized skills those agents hold.
Dynamic Queue Position: Dynamic Queue Position relies on the assignment of Service Objectives at
the Vector Directory Number (VDN) level to create a blended queue that can provide the advantages
of shorter wait time to some calls without creating the adverse conditions of traditional queue priority
assignments. Calls that merge from different VDNs into a single queue can be placed so that their wait
times are in proportion to the Service Objectives of their VDNs. From the agents perspective, a single
skill can accommodate calls of a variety of values or degrees of importance. Transferred calls can get
advantage over others, or customer value segmentation can be implemented without adding skills to
the contact center.

The Least Occupied Agent Selection method and the occupancy calculation it employed were available originally only as part of the
Avaya Business Advocate software, but are now also available as part of the Avaya Call Center Elite software package with Release 9
and onward.

The following table can be used to understand how the predictive and adaptive techniques of Avaya
Business Advocate can favorably impact a contact centers operations.

Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

What predictive wait

Expected Wait Time (EWT) is Avayas recommended technique to

time evaluations can the

evaluate how long a call will be expected to wait from the time it first

solution provide on behalf

arrives. EWT is used in conjunction with the activation of Reserve

of arriving calls?

agents (see below) in an Avaya Business Advocate design. The

components of the calculation include data relevant to staffing and the
skill mix and skill preference levels of those skills, such as inbound ACD
call arrival rates, call abandon rates, call handling rates and call handle
times. A typical goal of most Load Balancing applications is to equalize
(make as uniform as possible) the average delay-to-answer (Average
Speed of Answer) treatment across all sites that support the application
from which that the caller desires service.

What predictive wait time

Expected Wait Time is the technique recommended to evaluate how

evaluations can the solution

much longer an inbound ACD call will wait from the time of evaluation

provide on behalf of a call at

until service, at any point in the calls wait in queue.

any point while still in queue

for service?
What predictive wait time

Predicted Wait Time (PWT) is Avayas recommended technique to

evaluations can the solution

evaluate wait times for calls at the head of their respective queues since

provide on behalf of a call at

it includes both the Current Wait Time of the call and the Weighted

the head of the queue?

Advance Time, the amount of time the caller is anticipated to remain

waiting if an agent who is presently available does not, in fact, take this
inbound ACD call, but instead takes another call that is waiting. This
feature can be used to provide an improved level of service for a skill
with a smaller number of staffed agents or that has a longer call
handling time relative to other skills

What techniques are available

Service Objectives are Avayas recommended technique to provide

to adjust the level of service

calibration of service levels to each skill. For example, a skill with a

for a particular skill?

Service Objective of 10 seconds could get a better level of service than a

skill with a Service Objective of 20 seconds, but without the pre-emptive
qualities of skill priority levels. This capability is exclusive to Avaya
Business Advocate (formerly known as CentreVu Advocate software.

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Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

The optional use of Service Objectives based on Vector Directory
Number (VDN) enables the Dynamic Queue Position software feature
of Avaya Dynamic Advocate. Dynamic Queue Position provides for the
building of a blended queue of callers, each with relative, but not
absolute, advantage over callers of lesser importance as calibrated
through Service Objectives assigned at the VDN level. There are many
types of calls in which some, but not total advantage is desirable.
Transferred calls, calls from higher value customers, or calls from
phones with certain II digits4 are examples of calls that can benefit from
some wait time advantage over the typical call to the same skill.

What techniques are available

Queue priority levels (low, medium, high and top) are still available

to adjust the level of service

with Avaya Business Advocate. The preemptive nature of queue

for a particular skill?

priorities, however, can create conditions where the service level of

lower priority calls may be affected adversely as a function of the arrival
of higher priority calls. All top priority calls will be handled prior to
all high calls, which will be handled prior to all medium calls, and
before all low calls, regardless of when any of these calls arrived into
queue. Service Objectives or Dynamic Queue Position generally replaces
queue priorities.
Skill preference levels are sometimes used to raise the amount of time an
agent spends on some types of calls, and to limit the amount of time an
agent spends serving other types of calls (those at lesser preference levels).
Skill preference levels (ranging downward in priority from 1 to 16, wherein
1 is the most primary) can be a successful part of a predictive and adaptive
design using Advocate in support of both single site and multi-site
resource optimization when the limitations of the method are offset by
compelling advantages, such as an agents ability to sell or an agents
technical proficiencies. Many users of Avaya Business Advocate, however,
simplify skill preference level assignments with the use of Reserve agent
skills, which are described later in this document.
Multi-queuing of calls and Overflowing to secondary skills are
possible, but not recommended, techniques to help calls get answered
sooner by queuing for alternative skills. Multi-queuing breaks the firstin, first-out (FIFO) order and makes it more difficult to evaluate the
ongoing performance of the call/contact center.

II, or Information Indicator digits, are sent along with Automatic Number Identification (ANI) to signify the type of device making the
call. Generally, call centers are concerned with II digits to treat some calls in special ways (e.g., cell phones are not routed through
prompted digit applications), or to invoke cautionary treatment for others (e.g, calls from payphones or prison phones are routed to
fraud protection agents).

Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

What techniques are available

The activation of Reserve agents based on evaluation of caller wait times

to protect the level of service

upon inbound ACD call arrival is Avayas recommended technique.

to a valued skill under bursty

Reserve agents (R1 and/or R2 agents) are made eligible dynamically and

conditions?

without manual intervention whenever excessive caller wait time is

detected through the comparison of the predictive EWT calculation to
administered Overload Thresholds. The use of Reserve agents is
discontinued automatically when those problems are resolved. The
Avaya Business Advocate capability, which drives the use of Reserve
agents is called Service Level Supervisor and also supports a per-skill,
assignable Call Selection Override capability so that the use of Reserve
agents to protect skill levels can be tailored to the business need.
Two Overload Thresholds (Overload1 and/or Overload2), corresponding
to the activation of two different tiers of Reserve agents, are supported as
well as a unique safety valve type setting to check Oldest Call Waiting
on the odd chance that Threshold conditions change abruptly.
The traditional approach of being able to check caller wait time and
change queue priorities or multi-queue calls, can even use check
backup skills, is still available to Avaya Business Advocate users; but,
generally is not used, in favor of the Reserve agent approach, which
maintains the first-in, first-out (FIFO) order and limits the use of
Reserves to those cases where their support is needed, based upon
application specific call handling guidelines.

At what point(s) in time over

Reserve agents (assigned by skill as either R1 agents only, R2 agents

the life of an inbound ACD call

only, or R1/R2 agents) can be made eligible at any time during the life

are the above techniques used?

of an inbound ACD call in Avaya MultiVantage software that is using

Avaya Call Center Elite with active Avaya Expert Agent Selection and
Avaya Business Advocate.
Reserve agents can be made eligible to handle a Reserve skill call
whenever that skill goes into an Overload (Overload1 and/or Overload2)
condition. Overload conditions occur whenever an arriving calls
Expected Wait Time (EWT) is higher than the Overload Threshold
administered for the skill. This is a proactive trigger, in that the arriving
call has not exceeded the Threshold in actual waiting time, but it could if
the pace of handling calls for that skill does not increase.
A second method to make Reserve agents eligible is to compare the wait
time of the oldest call in queue against the Overload Threshold. This is a
responsive rather than predictive method, but it can be helpful for skills
where the call volume or agent staffing levels may change abruptly.

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Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

Will techniques used to cope

The use of Reserve agents maintains FIFO within each queue.

with bursty or heavy demand

Reserve agents take calls from the same queue as the Primary [standard

maintain first-in-first-out

(non-Reserve)] agents for the skill. Moreover, a Reserve agent will not

(FIFO) order in the queue?

take a Reserve skill call that has zero wait time, unless the inbound ACD
calls arrival creates an immediate Overload condition.
Other techniques commonly used to supplement the staffing to a skill
tend to disrupt FIFO order, such as multi-queuing or overflowing calls
to secondary skills, wherein supplementary staff holds the secondary
skill. Moreover, a Reserve agent is not available for an inbound ACD call
that has just arrived when the skill implicated is not in Overload; by
contrast, when skill preference levels are used to hide agents for backup call handling, the skill-level agent becomes available and is assigned
a call that has just arrived.

How is call selection

Call selection is performed when an agent becomes available and calls

performed?

are waiting in queue, as would be the case under call surplus conditions
when the center has more inbound ACD calls for a skill than available
(idle) agents for that same skill. Call selection is the term used to
describe the decision and action that causes a logged-in, active call
center agent to be connected to a waiting call.
Call selection may or may not include evaluation of an agents Reserve
skill calls, depending on whether any of those Reserve skills actually are
in Overload.
In general, the next inbound ACD call the active agent handles will be
the Greatest Need call, the one with the highest Predicted Wait Time
(PWT) compared to the desired Service Objective. This selection rule can
be modified, on an agent basis, to select the highest skill level call (1 is
highest priority downward to 16) with the Greatest Need.
Performing call selection based on Predicted Wait Time eliminates very
long wait times for callers because of its perspective on the expected
consequences that result from each call choice. Maximum delays and
caller-abandoned calls tend to diminish because this methodology helps
to eliminate long wait times.
Service Objectives used in call selection help to adjust the level of service to
the appropriate level for each skill, fostering an environment where the
value or urgency of each skill can be made actionable in a consistent way. If

Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

Dynamic Queue Position is active as part of the optional Avaya Dynamic
Advocate, Service Objectives can also be set at the Vector Directory Number
level. This capability can be helpful in providing that calls transferred
within, or between systems, are given advantage over other calls queued
directly to the skill, without adversely affecting those calls in the way that
traditional queue priority can. Dynamic Queue Position can also be helpful
in providing wait time advantages to calls based on II digits, or to different
tiers or values of callers, where absolute queue priorities may cause great
swings in service level to the callers with lower priorities.

How is agent selection

Agent selection is performed when an inbound ACD call arrives for

performed?

which agents are presently available (idle). This is a case of agent

surplus conditions wherein there are more idle (available) agents for the
desired skill/application than there are queued calls.
Agent selection can be performed in a variety of methods, and each skill
in the design can use a different method.
The Least Occupied Agent method is designed to select the agent
whose recent workload is the least, compared on a percentage basis,
among the available (idle) agents with suitable skill. This method can be
used either with a prior evaluation to find the most proficient of agents
(Expert Agent Distribution-Least Occupied Agent, or EAD-LOA) or
without the evaluation of proficiency (Uniform Call DistributionLeast
Occupied Agent, or UCD-LOA).
The LOA methods can distribute work more fairly among agents,
helping to reduce hot seats caused when some agents have many
skills compared to others.
The Most Idle Agent method is designed to select the agent who, among
the available agents with suitable skill, has been idle longest since his
last call. This method can be used either with a prior evaluation to find
the most proficient of agents (Expert Agent Distribution-Most Idle
Agent, or EAD-MIA) or without the evaluation of proficiency (Uniform
Call DistributionMost Idle Agent, or UCD-MIA).
Most Idle Agent methods can create hot seats for agents with many
assigned skills when compared to others, and can be useful in situations
where agents are motivated through an incentive plan to handle as
many calls as possible.

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Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

What techniques reduce

The Least Occupied Agent method of agent selection allows agent

discrepancies in agent

selection to bypass the available agents with the highest workload in

workload?

favor of the available agent with the least workload. If applied as UCDLOA, the least occupied of all the available agents is selected. If applied
as MIA-LOA, the least occupied of the most proficient available agents
is selected. Meanwhile, agents with higher workload remain idle, even if
only momentarily, decreasing their occupancies.

What techniques are available

Predicted Wait Time and Service Objectives used in call selection

to automate the control of the

maintain service levels at the appropriate level on a skill, and potentially

call center?

a VDN, basis under normal call volume conditions. Caller wait time
problems are identified through the use of Expected Wait Time and
Oldest Call comparisons against Overload Thresholds administered by
skill. Reserve agents (R1 and/or R2) are made eligible when wait time
problems are detected. The eligibility of Reserve agents is discontinued
when those wait time problems are resolved.

What techniques improve the

Revenue capacity is determined generally by the number of inbound

centers capacity to generate

revenue opportunity ACD calls a call center enterprise can take, and by

revenue?

how well the agents perform on each call. Agents can be kept focused
on their areas of highest potential revenue contribution by using Avaya
Business Advocate to assign high contribution skills as Primary skills
and all lesser contribution skills as Reserve skills. An agent will take
only Primary, or high revenue, skills through out the day, unless a
callers expected wait time delay for a Reserve skill outweighs the needs
of the Primary (non-reserve) skills. This represents a Match Rate
design using Avaya Business Advocate.
Overall quantity of revenue calls is also enhanced through superior call
completion rates, achieved through averting excessive wait-to-answer
delays, and the resulting caller abandonment, that generally occur when
using traditional call selection methods like Oldest Call Waiting.

What techniques improve the

Overall call completion rates can rise in Avaya Business Advocate

centers capacity to operate

implementations because wait times that lead to abandoned calls are

efficiently?

reduced. Staffing can often be reduced as well because staffing for peaks
or bursty levels of traffic can be curbed, through the supplementing of
staffing on an as-needed basis, automatically (without human
intervention) with the use of Reserve Agents.

Design Question

Avaya Business Advocate on Avaya MultiVantage Software

Too much efficiency, or over-service, of some inbound ACD call types

can be a problem that both Avaya Business Advocate and Avaya
Dynamic Advocate Service Objectives may be well suited to solve, in
conjunction with changing some Primary (non-reserve) agents/
assignments to Reserve agent (R1 and/or R2) assignments for the overserved skill. Highly qualified or overly busy agents are good
candidates for this switch in assignment, which still can leave them
available to support a skill in time of true need while preventing them
from contributing to over-servicing their less important assigned skill(s)
at other times.

Summary:
Avaya Business Advocate provides predictive and adaptive techniques to enable a contact center to be
both efficient and effective, using agent resources, from call to call, in the way that will help the center
achieve its objectives for both. During periods of call surplus (calls in queue), caller wait times will be at
the right level, meaning in rough proportion to their assigned Service Objectives. Maximum wait times
tend to be aligned by Service Objectives and usually lower than in previous operation. Abandon rates are
often lower than previous levels when wait times are reduced. Call completion levels can increase as a
result. In some centers, agents work less in their back-up roles than before, as work in these roles is limited
to period of need. During periods of agent surplus (no calls in queue and agents available) agent
occupancy will tend to reach a common level as busier agents are passed by in favor of less occupied
agents when possible. Finally, the need for center managers to change agents skills in real-time declines;
centers often discontinue this practice entirely.

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 2002 Avaya Inc.

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