One of the major factors behind poor customer experience in a call center is call center shrinkage – the unavailability of call center agents to respond to customers’ queries.
If the agents are not readily available to deal with clients, the outcome is:
- Lower Customer Satisfaction Score
- Lower Conversion Rate
- Higher Abondement Rate
Surely you don’t want this scenario for your call center, right?
This is exactly why calculating call center shrinkage is paramount for maximizing the productivity of the agents.
In this blog, I will provide you with answers to the following questions:
- What is Call Center Shrinkage?
- How to Calculate Call Center Shrikange?
- What are the key practices to reduce call center shrinkage?
So, let’s dig in!
What is Call Center Shrinkage?
Alright, let’s start with the definition first – gotta start with the basics!
Call center shrinkage, simply put, is the time agents are paid but aren’t actually available to handle customer interactions.
In other words, it’s the gap between scheduled work hours and productive talk time.
This includes things like breaks, meetings, training, sick leave, and even just being late – essentially any paid time agents aren’t actively engaging with customers.
Call center shrinkage is the exact opposite of occupancy rate – the percentage of time spent by agents on call with the clients.
The most important point to remember at this stage is that the outcome of a higher percentage of shrinkage is poor customer experience and a lower conversion rate.
The following graph shows how a higher shrinkage rate leads to a lower CSAT score and vice versa.
How to Calculate Call Center Shrinkage?
Now, I will briefly explain the formula and process of calculating call center shrinkage.
Let’s try to understand this process with the following example:
Imagine a small call center team of three agents: John, Danny, and Charlotte.
Let’s have a look at their scheduled paid time and the time they were unavailable for customer interactions during a single 8-hour (480-minute) shift on a particular day.
John:
Total Scheduled Paid Time: 480 minutes
Time Away (Breaks + Training): 15 minutes + 60 minutes = 75 minutes
Danny:
Total Scheduled Paid Time: 480 minutes
Time Away (Break + System Issues): 20 minutes + 25 minutes = 45 minutes
Charlotte:
Total Scheduled Paid Time: 480 minutes
Time Away (Break + Team Meeting): 15 minutes + 30 minutes = 45 minutes
Calculate Total Paid Time for the Team:
480 minutes (John) + 480 minutes (Danny) + 480 minutes (Charlotte) = 1440 minutes
Calculate Total Away Time for the Team:
75 minutes (John) + 45 minutes (Danny) + 45 minutes (Charlotte) = 165 minutes
Calculate Overall Call Center Shrinkage:
(Total Away Time for the Team / Total Paid Time for the Team) * 100%
(165 minutes / 1440 minutes) * 100% = 11.46% (approximately)
And this is what the overall scenario will look like:
| Agent | Scheduled Paid Time (min) | Time Away (min) | Total Away Time (min) |
| John | 480 | Breaks (15) + Training (60) | 75 |
| Danny | 480 | Break (20) + System Issues (25) | 45 |
| Charlotte | 480 | Break (15) + Team Meeting (30) | 45 |
| Total | 1440 | 165 |
Shrinkage = (1440165)×100% ≈ 11.46%
In this example: The overall call center shrinkage for this team during this 8-hour shift is approximately 11.46%.
So what does this shrinkage rate mean for this call center?
This means that out of the total paid time for all three agents, 11.46% of that time was spent on activities other than directly handling customer interactions – an excellent shrinkage rate.
Different Types of Call Center Shrinkage
There are two types of call center shrinkage, and I will explain their differences in this section:
1. Planned Shrinkage
Planned shrinkage refers to agent time away from handling customer interactions that is scheduled and anticipated.
This type of shrinkage is generally predictable and can be factored into staffing forecasts.
Christmas holidays or any other public holidays are an example of planned shrinkage.
2. Unplanned Shrinkage
Imagine the last time you felt under the weather and had to call in sick.
This is exactly what unplanned shrinkage represents: an unplanned, sudden, and unexpected break from work.
| Planned Shrinkage | Unplanned Shrinkage |
| Scheduled in Advance | An unexpected, unscheduled leave |
| Predicitble – attending a scheduled meeting | Very hard to predict – no agent knows when they will get sick |
| Can be factored into forecasts | Can negatively impact customer support service levels |
| Examples: Meetings, Vacations, Lunch Time | Examples: Sick leaves, Electricity breakdown, Family Emergency |
The Negative Impact of Call Center Shrinkage in 2025
Call center shrinkage is the amount of time agents spend not handling customers’ calls.
Okay, you got the idea. Now, the question is, what are the drawbacks of this shrinkage?
Let’s discuss it in detail.
1. Poor Customer Experience
Imagine a customer trying to call a popular mobile network’s helpline because their internet isn’t working.
He’s already frustrated, right?
Now, suppose the user is put on hold… and he waits… and waits… because there aren’t enough agents available to answer your call promptly.
But why?
Well, maybe a bunch of agents are in a long training session, or there’s a higher-than-usual number of unexpected sick leaves today.
This is an extremely common issue faced by customers dealing with customer service agents (particularly of less-established brands).
To summarize this point, call center shrinkage results in longer hold times and increased abandonment rates, leading to extremely poor customer support service.
2. Higher Operational Costs
You’re paying your agents for their scheduled time, right?
But if your agents are not instantly available to receive calls from customers and resolve their queries, then you will have to hire additional resources to manage this.
This will cost you a lot of money – like a lot!
For example, imagine you run a popular online store selling beautiful handcrafted furniture.
You’ve carefully tracked and expect to have 50 stylish coffee tables ready to ship this month.
However, you soon discover that due to the unavailability of some workers because of various reasons, only 45 coffee tables are actually in sellable condition.
You were supposed to have 50, but you only have 45.
That’s a shrinkage rate of 10% (5/50 *100)!
This is how the higher 10% shrinkage rate leads to higher operational costs:
-> You are missing out on 5 potential sales
-> To fulfill those remaining 5 orders, you’ll need to order more raw materials, costing extra money.
-> 5 customers are now unhappy because of this. Now, it is likely they will not place the order again.
No wonder shrinkage costs call center businesses in the USA more than $61 billion.
3. Inability of the Call Center to Meet SLAs
To understand this point, let’s have a look at this example:
Suppose you have promised the clients that 80% of all incoming calls will be answered within 20 seconds (that’s a common SLA).
To hit this target, you need a certain number of agents available and ready to take calls at any given time.
But what happens when a significant portion of our team is experiencing shrinkage?
The result of shrinkage is that this 20-second target becomes a distant dream as agents are not available to attend calls and listen to their complaints.
The pre-determined SLA is not met, severely damaging the reputation of your call center.
Reducing Shrinkage: Proven Tips for Your Call Center
To make your life easier, I have compiled a list of techniques that can help you reduce call center shrinkage:
1. Utilize Technology to Monitor Agents’ Perormance
The most important rule when it comes to reducing shrinkage is keeping track of agents’ performance and making sure they adhering to the schedules.
For this purpose, it is a great idea to utilize various software and tools.
For example, certain tools provide a clear view of each agent’s current status – are they on a call, available, on break, in after-call work, or in a non-productive state?
Source: kaizo
A high percentage of time in “not available” signifies potential areas for investigation and optimization.
This way, you can make sure agents are sticking to their schedule and attending the calls during their paid time.
Below are some of the popular tools to help you in this regard:
1. Time Doctor
2. Zoho
3. Slack
2. Offer Incentives For Sudden Change in Shift
It’s an undeniable fact that there are times when an agent calls in sick or has to leave early because of a family emergency.
Doesn’t matter how hard you try to avoid this situation; you cannot force agents to deal with clients in such situations.
So, how to handle this situation?
What you can do is offer incentives to the other available agents to cover their shifts. You can also introduce the concept of offering double pay for working on public holidays.
Remember that a higher number of available agents means more calls are attended, and shrinkage is reduced.
Here are some of the incentives to convince agents to cover for another agent’s shifts:
| Type of Incentive | Explanation |
| Additional Paid Time Off | For their flexibility, reward agents with extra vacation hours or days to compensate |
| Recognition and Awards | Certificates or public recognition for agents |
| Transportation Allowances | Bear travel expenses incurred due to sudden shift changes |
| Double Pay | Offer double payments for agents covering shifts on public holidays |
3. Focus on Improved Attendences
Another key method to reduce call center shrinkage is making sure the percentage of agents on leave is as low as possible.
To achieve this objective, you can implement measures like the following:
- Reduce the number of paid leaves
- Install software to track the attendance of employees
- Offer double salary for agents willing to work on paid leaves or public holidays
- At the end of each month, highlight and reward the most punctual agents.
By ensuring that a maximum number of agents are present at the call center at a particular time period, you can reduce shrinkage, leading to more satisfied customers.
Conclusion
Long story short, call center shrinkage refers to the amount of time agents are unavailable to handle calls from valuable customers, leaving them frustrated with the customer support service.
Keep in mind that:
- A lower shrinkage rate means a higher number of satisfied customers.
- A higher shrinkage rate means more customers are unhappy with your call center’s performance.
If you are looking for a call center that prioritizes customer satisfaction via an extremely low shrinkage rate, HiredSupport is a great option for you.
Fill out this form today, and share your queries with our customer service team.
FAQs
1. What is the ideal shrinkage rate for a call center?
While there’s no magic number, generally, a well-managed call center aims for a total shrinkage rate between 25-35%.
2. How does remote work impact call center shrinkage rates?
While remote work eases travel issues, it can raise shrinkage rates due to limited monitoring and more frequent unplanned interruptions like technical issues or personal distractions at home
3. How often should you calculate our call center shrinkage rate?
There is no hard and fast rule for this. You can calculate the shrinkage rate weekly or even on a daily basis.
