Contact centers must focus on how to meet the needs of customers who are increasingly mobile, increasingly connected, and increasingly impatient with slow service. The need to support a growing variety of customer interaction channels and tools is driving call centers to modernize their technology and expand connectivity options. Best Practices, LLC conducted this benchmarking study to identify performance benchmarks for the size, cost, service delivery efficiency, structure, leadership, processes, technology, and operations of call center organizations for consumers/ OTC companies within pharmaceutical and related industries. The study also provides participants with current metrics for call center performance in the pharmaceutical, medical device, biotech, diagnostics, consumer health, and consumer packaged goods industries.

1. Building a World-Class Call Center:
Performance Metrics, Operations,
Structures & Trends at Consumer/OTC
Companies
Best Practices, LLC
Strategic Benchmarking Research
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

2. Table of Contents
I.
Executive Summary





Research Project Overview
Participating Companies
Key Insights & Benchmark Findings
Key Performance Metrics at a Glance
Definitions
II.
Call Center Structure & Focus
III.
Operations
IV.
Complaint Management Process
V.
Performance Metrics
VI.
Technology Use & Impact
VII. Future Trends & Issues
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

3. Research Project Overview
Best Practices, LLC conducted this benchmarking study to identify performance benchmarks
for the size, cost, service delivery efficiency, structure, leadership, processes, technology, and
operations of call center organizations for consumers/ OTC companies within pharmaceutical and
related industries.
Objectives & Methodology
Research Objective:
 Provide participants with current metrics for call center performance in the
pharmaceutical, medical device, biotech, diagnostics, consumer health, and
consumer packaged goods industries
Benchmarking Methodology:
 Create and deploy custom benchmarking survey
 Deploy survey tool online to call center leaders across the industry
 Develop key performance metrics and ratios from quantitative survey data
 Develop insights through conducting in-depth executive interviews with selected
participants
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

4. Best Practices, LLC Studied Call Centers at 35 Companies
Nine call center leaders from 9 OTC (Over the Counter), and consumer packaged goods
companies participated in this study. Participation was limited to call centers operating in the
United States or Canada.
Participating Companies: Benchmark Class
Participating Companies: Alcon, Colgate Palmolive, GSK Consumer, Merck Consumer, Nestle Health Care, Novartis
Consumer, Pfizer Consumer, Procter & Gamble, Reckitt Benckiser
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
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5. Participating Call Centers: A Brief Profile
Industry
Nearly half the centers support at least two different industry segments.
The percentage of respondents supporting each industry segment is:
 78% OTC
 44% consumer packaged goods products and devices or diagnostics
 33% prescription drug business
Structure
44% operate as internal corporate functions, 22% are run by vendors, and 33%
are mixed internal/vendor models.
Reporting
33% report into Medical Affairs and Marketing Others are widely distributed,
reporting into functions ranging from Sales to Technical Services to Safety.
Leadership
Leaders most often work in director-level
positions and report up to senior executives.
Focus
Area
Top focus areas are medical inquiries & medical
or technical complaints and safety.
Approach
66% have regional/country specific structures.
Products
Call centers support 141 products on average, with
a range from 45 to 213. .
Location
100% are located in the United States.
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6. Key Insights
•
AMBIGUITY IN LEADERSHIP COMPOSITION OF OTC CALL CENTERS: While more than 75% of
OTC call centers focus on medical inquiries and drug safety, there seems to be low representation
in the leadership team for both Drug Safety and Medical Affair. Only 22% of those groups have
direct reporting members on the leadership team. This is especially unusual for Medical Affairs since
one-third of all the call centers report to Medical Affairs.
•
COMPLAINT RESOLUTION: OTC products are usually a cross between prescription drug and
FMCG products and are present in market from the past several years. The technical information for
these products is readily available and accessible to the first-line agents. Consequently, about twothirds of calls are handled by first-line agents. And the first-line agents successfully resolve 89% of
the complaints during the first call, This highlights the efficiency of OTC call center agents in working
with customers.
•
PREVENT RECURRING PROBLEMS: Of complaints that are not resolved in the first call, 50% of
the OTC segment manages them in the call center itself . Another 13% of companies send the
callers to a specialized complaint resolution group. In line with this, 14% of calls handled by call
centers fall in Tier 2-3 that get escalated to call center leads or subject matter experts. Use of
regular reporting and trending is considered to be the best approach to identify and prevent
recurring issues by all the benchmark partners in OTC benchmark class.
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

7. 66% of Centers Have Regional/Country Specific Structures
The majority of benchmarked companies use a regional or country specific structure for call center
operations.
Q. What type of structure does your call center reflect? (choose one)
Call Center Structure
A globalized
center covering
multiple regions/
countries, 34%
Regional/
country- specific
call centers, 66%
(n = 8)
% of Responses
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

8. Call Centers Most Often Report to Medical Affairs or Marketing
One-third of participating call centers report either into Medical Affairs or Marketing, the remainder are
widely distributed throughout the organizations, reporting into functions ranging from Sales to
Technical Services to Safety.
Q. To what function does the leader of your call center report?
Function to which Call Center Reports
Medical Affairs
33%
Marketing
33%
Sales
11%
Other
(n = 9)
22%
% of Responses
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

9. Majority Have Back-Up Centers in Place for High Call Volume
Back-up call centers, separate from the primary centers, are in place at 62% of participating
companies to handle large fluctuations in call volume. In all, 38% of companies use vendors to
provide back-up services, while 25% provide back-up internally.
Q. Do you have a back-up call center—separate from your primary center—in place to handle unexpected situations (such
as a recall) that cause large fluctuations in call volume? (choose one)
Back-Up Center
No, 38%
Yes, back-up
provided by a
vendor, 38%
63%
Yes, back-up
provided
internally, 25%
(n = 33)
% of Responses
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

10. Complaints Often Owned and Managed by Call Centers
Half of participating call centers own and manage complaints that are not resolved during the first
call, while 38% route difficult complaints to specialized resolution groups or assign specialist
agents to manage them.
Q. For complaints that are not resolved during the first call, what approach best describes your company's system for
tracking and resolving complaints? (choose one)
Complaint Resolution Approaches
50%
Call center owns and manages complaints
Customer service handles simple complaints and sends more
difficult complaints to resolution
38%
Complaints are exported to a specialized complaint resolution
group
13%
Account representatives handle complaint resolution for their
accounts
0%
Customers and their complaints are segmented by customer
value or complaint severity and exported to complaint
resolution groups
0%
Assign specific agents to own individual complaints until
resolved
0%
Other
0%
(n = 8)
% of Responses
10
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®
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11. RATIO
Cost per Call Averages $14 for Total Benchmark Class
Participating call centers spend an average of $14 per call they handle, based on the ratio of annual
budget to total calls.
Cost ($ Budget) per Call
Segment
Analysis
$29
$16
$14
$12
$9
$6
Max
75th Percentile
Mean
Median
25th Percentile
Min
(n = 6)
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®
LLC

12. SERVICE
LEVEL
Call Centers Take Median Average of 24,025 Calls per Month
The average number of monthly inbound calls ranges from a low of 298 to a high of 100,000 across
the benchmark class. Outbound calls are generally a small fraction of the total. High call volume is
directly linked to low budget per call.
Q. What is your average number of inbound and outbound calls per month?
Average Number of Calls per Month
Average # inbound calls
24,750
Volume/Cost Correlation
Higher average monthly call
volume correlates with lower
budget per call. For example,
companies with more than 5,000
calls per month had an ‘cost per
call’ of $21.68—less than onethird of $72.44 cost at centers
with less than 5,000 calls
Average # outbound calls
# Calls
24,025
Average#
Calls/Month
< 5K
728
75th Percentile
(n = 8)
483
Mean
$
72.44
10
>5K
5,625
Average
Budget/Call
$
21.68
10
n=
163
* 25th Percentile
* =Top quartile
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BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC

13. About Best Practices, LLC
Best Practices, LLC is a research and consulting firm that conducts work
based on the simple yet profound principle that organizations can chart a
course to superior economic performance by studying the best business
practices, operating tactics, and winning strategies of world-class companies.
Best Practices, LLC
6350 Quadrangle Drive, Suite 200
Chapel Hill, NC 27517
www.best-in-class.com
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Copyright © Best Practices, LLC
BEST PRACTICES,
®
LLC