First Response Time (FRT)
Date created: Oct 12, 2022 • Last updated: Mar 18, 2024
What is First Response Time?
First Response Time (FRT) is the average amount of time an agent takes to provide an initial response to a customer inquiry or support ticket. The speed at which you acknowledge a customer's question is a reflection of your commitment to customer satisfaction and the maturity and efficiency of your call centre.
First Response Time Formula
How to calculate First Response Time
At your call centre, customers raised 50 support tickets in one month. Your support team responded to every ticket, and spent a total of 3000 minutes sending first responses to these tickets. The First Response Time for that month is 3000 minutes / 50 tickets = 60 minutes.
Start tracking your First Response Time data
Use Klipfolio PowerMetrics, our free analytics tool, to monitor your data. Choose one of the following available services to start tracking your First Response Time instantly.
What is a good First Response Time benchmark?
For a ticketing system, most users expect a response in less than 24 hours. For live chat, less than 1.5 minutes, and for phone, 3 minutes is considered good (though rare).
How to visualize First Response Time?
Use a summary chart to display your current First Response Time and compare it to a previous time period.
First Response Time visualization example
Summary Chart
First Response Time
Chart
Measuring First Response TimeMore about First Response Time
Monitoring and analyzing First Response Time (FRT) helps you understand how to handle increases and decreases in ticket volume. The goal is to set expectations for your customers and your agents by maintaining a consistent FRT.
To do this, you need to understand how efficient your agents are, how holidays or busy periods impact ticket volume, and how to scale quickly when there’s an unexpected spike in ticket volume (for example, during a technical outage).
The positive customer relationship that results from a low FRT can be a major differentiator and often results in follow-on purchases and expansion revenue. Mapping your FRT to Net Promoter Score (NPS), or a similar survey, can help you understand how your customers react to wait times.
A slow FRT often inflates the initial incident and, even worse, can cause a frustrated customer to submit multiple tickets. In addition, customers who experience a slow FRT are more likely to tell their friends about it than if they had a quick FRT.
Even if you don’t yet have an answer, you should respond to the customer. A customer who has been acknowledged is a happier customer.
Metric Toolkit
Start tracking your First Response Time data
Use Klipfolio PowerMetrics, our free analytics tool, to monitor your data. Choose one of the following available services to start tracking your First Response Time instantly.