If you’re looking into the benefits of hiring a call service, one of the things you’ll need to understand is how pricing works. No call center has one-size-fits-all pricing. Why? Because each client has different needs and requirements to help their business flow.
The price for occasional services only required on the weekends is going to differ from a business that hires our staff to handle all of their calls, emails, and live chat needs. This is why we work with each business to create a plan that works best for you.
How is Call Center Pricing Determined?
The price for each business is determined by several factors. When we work with you to come up with a customized plan, we’ll go over factors such as:
– Anticipated call volume
– Complexity of call answering service required
– Anticipated duration
– Outbound, inbound, and shared resources
– Certification requirements including HIPAA, insurance licensure, etc.
– Special requirements such as multi-lingual speakers
– Licensing of technology (when integrated with internal CRM)
Depending on the complexity of the program desired, there might also be factors such as training and setup costs. However, fees will always be based on your specific business needs. Why is this a good thing? Because you can be sure that you’ll only pay for what you need. You won’t be charged extra for items you don’t require or time we don’t use on your behalf. At Answer United, we’ve found that working with each company is the best way to ensure you get a program and pricing model that provides the exact services you need.
General Call Center Pricing Info
When it comes to the general pricing breakdown, you can expect two categories of pricing: outbound calling and inbound calling.
Outbound calling includes items like:
– Customer follow-ups
– Marketing calls
– Advertisement calls
– Order and appointment reminders
– Sales calls
In addition to the services offered, price breakdown occurs according to the basis of the anticipated call volume and call complexity. For example, a high volume of calls with low complexity requirements will likely be a lower rate than a high call volume with highly complex calls.
Setup and training fees might also be required depending on complexity, certification, and licensure requirements.
Inbound calling includes items like:
– Customer order inquires
– Email reading and response services
– Live web chat
– Client appointment requests
– Order processing
– Dealer locating
To price incoming calls, there are generally two options: per minute and hour. If you expect a low volume or inconsistent amount of phone calls, then we might suggest a per-minute basis. This means that the agents working on your inbound calls might also serve another business’s low-volume calls as well. There are always enough agents to handle all calls, but sharing agents on a per-minute cost basis has the potential to save you much more money when you have a low call volume.
If you have a high enough volume of incoming calls, then we’d likely recommend a per-hour rate where you’ll have dedicated agents that solely handle your calls.
Naturally, the per-minute and hourly rates widely differ and that’s where we will sit down to help you determine which model makes the most sense for your business.
Pricing of a Call Center vs. Hiring Employees
The biggest difference in pricing comes when you compare services received from a call center vs services rendered by your employees. Most employees are hired to complete specific tasks – not answer the phone, answer emails, or spend their day providing appointment reminders and follow-up calls.
If you decide to hire an employee (or five) to handle incoming and outgoing calls and emails, then you’ll not only have their salaries to worry about, but you’ll also need to pay for taxes, health insurance, sick leave, paid time off, training, in-service days, and holidays. Not to mention licensing and tech requirements, rent, utilities, and other expenses related to hiring a team dedicated to handling your call volume.
The worst part is that, even if you jump through all the hoops to hire an internal customer service team, you’ll only have your employees available for a standard 40-hour workweek. No after-hours, late-night, or weekend order taking, event registration, help desk services, or any of the many things a call center can provide.
When you hire an answering service, you’ll save on all the expenses listed above and receive as much as three times the amount of coverage! When you look at it that way, we think you’ll agree that hiring a call center is more than worth it!
Give us a call at 800-937-5900 or schedule a demo and we’ll help you figure out which package works best for your business!
