What is Average speed of answer?
Average speed of answer is the average time an answered contact waits in queue before an agent accepts it, usually excluding abandoned contacts.
- Aliases
- Average speed of answer technology, average wait time
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Why is average speed of answer important for queue performance?
Average speed of answer shows how long answered customers typically wait before an agent accepts the interaction.
- Signals whether staffing is keeping pace with demand.
- Shows the effect of routing and priority rules.
- Helps set and evaluate service-level targets.
- Reveals periods when queues need intervention.
How Average speed of answer works
- Start the clock when a contact enters the answer queue under the published eligibility rule.
- Stop it when a human or qualifying automated agent answers, and retain abandoned contacts separately.
- Divide total answer delay for the included answered contacts by their count, then report percentiles and service level beside the mean.
Average speed of answer in action
A support line answers 900 calls with 45,000 total seconds of eligible queue delay, so ASA is 50 seconds. The team also reports an eight-minute p95 and a 12% abandonment rate to avoid presenting the average as the whole experience.
How Average speed of answer is measured or evaluated
Use a stable definition and representative production data. Review these measures together:
- average speed of answer: total eligible wait for answered contacts divided by answered contacts
- service level: percentage answered within the target threshold
- median and p95 answer delay
- abandonment rate and time to abandonment
Limitations, risks, and common failure modes
- Excluding abandoned calls can make a poor queue look healthy.
- Transfers or IVR time may be included differently across systems.
- One severe tail can be hidden by a stable average.
Average speed of answer vs. average wait time
ASA usually covers answered contacts from queue entry to answer. Average wait time may use a broader population or include other waiting periods, so the two are not interchangeable without matching definitions.
What teams should consider when using or implementing Average speed of answer
- Publish the exact start event, stop event, and exclusions.
- Separate initial answers from transfers and callbacks.
- Segment by queue, priority, hour, and channel.
- Pair ASA with abandonment and resolution outcomes.
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Related terms
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