Troubleshooting Common Issues with IVR Auto Attendant Functionality
The IVR auto attendant VoIP feature is becoming increasingly popular for businesses looking to increase both internal and external efficiency. This feature allows a business to pre-record prompts and greetings that provide customers with easy access the information they need or the person they need to speak to. Despite its popularity and benefits, sometimes customers experience problems with IVR auto attendant functionality. In this article, we’ll help these customers troubleshoot these issues. If you're searching for auto attendant providers, check out FSB's analysis of top auto attendant systems in 2019.
Related: Learn more about AVOXI's IVR software
Calls routing to the wrong person
One aspect of IVR auto attendant that makes it so popular for businesses is its ability to automatically route calls based on a customer’s prompts. However, you may experience an incident where incoming calls are being routed to the wrong person.
Since every aspect of your IVR auto attendant can be customized, including the personal greeting and the rules behind call routing, it’s possible that the reason your calls are being misrouted is because of the settings you’ve created. Check your personalized rules to make sure that the specific prompt is pointing to the phone you need.
Confusing or misunderstood prompts
As mentioned above, every aspect of your IVR auto attendant can be personalized to your liking and requirements. That means that your pre-recorded greetings can be changed and altered as needed. If you are new to the IVR auto attendant feature, you may have some trouble with the structure of your greeting, which can cause confusion for customers who are trying to select specific prompts.
If you find that your customers are having trouble understanding your greeting or your prerecorded directions, you may need to alter your messages. This is easy to do using the settings provided by your VoIP provider. Before you record the new greetings, think about the questions that your customers may have, and develop simple ways to deliver important information to your customers.
Customer complaints about the system
Despite their popularity, IVR auto attendant systems do have their critics. One complaint that these critics have is that these systems eliminate human interaction. As a result, some argue that the auto attendant feature can cause more problems because callers have to wait to get through to the person they’re trying to contact.
This criticism is easy to combat. An IVR auto attendant is made to help make a business phone system more efficient, not inconvenient for your callers. If you find that you’re receiving negative feedback regarding your system, consider these tips.
Make your greeting shorter.
The less time your customers are listening to a prerecorded message, the less time they’re on hold waiting to reach someone. You can also automatically send callers to a person after a specific number of rings. This will help direct calls to a “catch-all” person who can help confused callers.
Add more call routing options.
Make your call routes more specific so customers aren’t constantly put on hold and transferred. For example, press 1 for sales, 2 for customer service.
Optimizing Your IVR Auto Attendant
As you can see, problems with IVR auto attendant can be easily alleviated with the help of your provider, or by altering your personal settings and configuration. This feature’s benefits greatly outweigh these minor issues you may experience and thus, should be considered for all businesses looking for an effective way to manage their business phone systems and their flow of incoming calls.
For more information on creating an effective and efficient IVR auto attendant, explore the articles below:
