A call queue distributes calls among several people according to a rule. This choice affects your team's comfort and your customers' experience more than any other setting.
Ring all at once
All available agents ring together. Answer time is as short as it can be, and it's the right choice for a small team. Beyond four or five people, it becomes exhausting: everyone is interrupted on every call, and the fastest person always answers.
Longest idle
The call goes to the person who hasn't taken a call for the longest time. It's the fairest setting over a day, and the one we recommend by default for a team of more than three people.
Fewest calls
The call goes to whoever has taken the fewest. It balances volume rather than timing, which is useful when calls vary a lot in length.
One after another
Agents ring in sequence, in list order. This is the structure of an escalation: first level, then second. Don't use it for fairness: it puts the load on the first names on the list.
The two timers, and the classic mistake
A queue has two different timers, and confusing them is the most common mistake. The maximum wait time caps the total time spent in the queue: it decides when the call leaves it. The ring time per agent caps a single attempt: it decides when to move to the next one.
What happens when the wait runs out
A queue must never be a dead end. When the time runs out, the call must go somewhere: a voicemail box, another department, a voice agent. A caller who hears a busy tone after three minutes on hold won't call back.
Permanent agents or on-demand agents
Choosing the strategy is only half the setup. The other half is deciding who makes up the queue. Permanent agents are attached to it permanently: they ring as soon as a call comes in, with nothing to do in the morning or evening. On-demand agents log into it when available, which suits occasional backup or a team for which the queue isn't the main job.
Mixing both works well: a dedicated team as permanent members, with backup agents joining the queue on peak days.
Measure before changing
Changing strategy on a hunch rarely produces a measurable result. Three figures are enough to decide: the number of calls per time slot, the average wait before answer, and the distribution of calls answered per agent. If one agent takes twice as many calls as a colleague under the "ring all at once" strategy, it's a sign to switch to "longest idle".
What to remember
- Small team: ring all at once
- More than three people: longest idle
- Escalation between levels: one after another
- Always plan where the call goes when the wait runs out
Details on all six strategies and four reports are on the call queues page.
The right setting is chosen on three numbers, and it can be changed on a live queue, with no interruption.
Talk to us about itYour agents complain about ringing for nothing?
Volume is often not the cause, the strategy is. Show us your reports, we'll tell you what we'd change.