Human Factor in a Call Centre

Human Factors of work in call centres

W. J. Mellors1, D. Anderson2, M. Böcker3, A. Clarke4 1 ANEC, 2Vodafone, UK, 3Siemens ICM, Munich, 4 European Management Services, UK

mellors_wmserv@compuserve.com

Abstract

This paper details the main recommendations of an ETSI report that deals with the human factors aspects of work in call centres. The report, which was written by a specialist Task Force (STF) funded by the eEurope initiative, was based on reviews of existing studies of call centre operation in the UK and other countries, supported by some practical research. The report was aimed at managers of call centres, their customers, call centre equipment and software designers and manufacturers, occupational health and human resources management. The focus was on call handlers, but the advice was also pertinent to employees with other roles in call centres. It identified jobs and tasks in call centres and the attributes and skills of call handlers and related training issues. The practical issues of disability were considered.

Key words: Call Centres, Human Factors 1. Introduction

The UK government published advice regarding call center working practices in 1999 and updated it in 2001 [HSE (2001)]. The Human Factors committee of ETSI thought that this advice should be given a wider audience and a Special Task Force (STF) was set up to confirm its validity in a European context and to produce a report describing the human factors of the tasks and of the typical working environment of call centre operators, giving examples of some of the problems arising in their work. The report [ETSI (2003)] set out to describe work practices to minimise the occurrence of such problems.

2.

Material and methods

In addition to the UK advice, the team's background information included advice from the German Federal Institute for Occupational Health and Safety, documents from trade associations such as FEDMA and the DMA, from trades unions such as the GMB and Unison...