A human touch makes a significant difference in healthcare call interactions where an automation-dominant approach would fall short.
The rise of AI-powered digital tools has convinced some companies that almost every customer service interaction can be automated. But research has shown that mass automation cannot replace friendliness, professionalism, and empathy. Not only are these aspects of humanity essential for improving the patient experience, but they help hospitals convert more callers to patients, whether for primary care or specialty care.
Health systems have had to walk a fine line between managing costs and managing queries in a way that’s both efficient and personable. Parlance delivers automation technology that is deployed strategically to support switchboard operators and call center agents. It is critical to provide a full spectrum of access for consumers to connect with a hospital. However, a significant number of people continue to contact health systems on the phone. Technology can be implemented to help hospital call centers make simple interactions more efficient while giving agents more time to support callers who have complex questions, older callers, and people with language barriers, hearing issues, etc.
Research from The Beryl Institute, based on analysis of more than 300,000 caller records and 12,000 abandoned calls on behalf of 190 hospitals, uncovered a grim statistic: 75% of people who abandon a call do not call back. Hospitals must change if they are to make up lost revenue. The Beryl Institute recommends adding staff and extending hours at call centers — call centers that run 24/7 can increase call volume by 30%, according to the Institute. It also recommends improving access, providing more training, and outsourcing call centers.
The characteristics that set apart callers in a healthcare context compared with callers in other areas such as retail and finance are the personal, often critical nature of these calls.
“Consumers who contact a hospital through its marketing call center generate, on average, nearly three times the amount of revenue for the hospital as compared to the overall patient population,” the Beryl Institute report stated. “That makes these callers critically important customers whether they are calling for a physician referral, class or event registration, or general hospital information. It also makes the impact on potential revenue loss due to abandonment rates one of the most important statistics a hospital needs to quantify and address. Yet it is one that is not often talked about around the executive table, in finance meetings, or as part of strategic discussions. It should be.”
A Medpage Today article noted that more than half (53%) of online healthcare complaints focused on poor communication, especially through phones. Common complaints included being placed on hold indefinitely, and not getting calls returned after repeated messages. It’s not surprising that nearly one in four callers during business hours were hanging up before getting an answer or leaving a voicemail. Long hold times accounted for 35% of complaints. People like their doctor, not their calling experience!
Parlance uses conversational AI to manage routine tasks that contribute to high call volume, such as removing simple internal transfer requests from agents’ workloads to prevent these calls from jamming up service lines. VP of IT Operations at a $2B Midwest health system says this, “Departments…are lining up to be next on Parlance.” Intelligent call routing not only solves agent burnout, but it also saves many Parlance healthcare clients upwards of $1M+ per year. A recent use case from this same large health system saw significant productivity and cost efficiency gains from simply adding Parlance to an after-hours answering service. This was accomplished by:
- Reduction of on-call pay and overtime pay
- Hiring avoidance for multiple vacant positions
- Increased caller self-service
