Australian Call Centre Industry Q3 2024 Call Centre Rankings

Executive Summary

The Q3 2024 public report provides a comprehensive view of customer experience (CX) performance across the six key sectors: Banks, Car Insurance providers, Councils, Education Providers, Internet Retailers and Energy Retailers, along with an analysis of overall industry trends.

Both sector-wide trends and business-specific results are explored, shedding light on performance gaps, operational efficiencies, and opportunities for improvement.

ACXPA Subscribers (free) and Members (paid) gain access to additional insights.

We also offer a paid benchmarking service that provides businesses with access to over 80 metrics for their contact centre and any five nominated competitors, delivering unparalleled data to enhance CX and operational performance.

1. Overall CX Scores

Industry Trends

• The sector-wide Overall CX Score for Q3 2024 was 53.0%, marking a slight decline from 53.1% in Q2. This is the lowest industry result recorded and represents the fifth consecutive quarter of decline.

• The drop in Overall CX scores is largely driven by declining Agent Mastery scores (the quality of live interactions), while Accessibility rankings have shown consistent improvement, making it easier for customers to connect to live agents.

• Significant performance disparities persist across sectors, with leaders such as Holmesglen TAFE achieving an impressive 75.9%, while underperformers like ING Bank scored only 17.4%.

Sector Highlights

• Banks have consistently ranked last in every quarter since the start of 2023. While their Q3 2024 results improved by +2.6% from Q2, their overall performance remains heavily impacted by ongoing challenges in getting customers through to a live agent.

• Education Providers have overtaken other sectors for the first time, achieving a sector-leading Overall CX Score of 64.5%, just ahead of Internet Retailers, which scored 63.6%.

The results underline the significant challenges faced by contact centres in delivering consistent, high-quality customer experiences. While there are notable performers, the overall trend indicates a decline in Agent Mastery skills, which are trending in the wrong direction.

Despite the increasing use of AI tools, knowledge management platforms, and intranets to assist agents, many contact centres are facing difficulties with soft skills.

This gap often results in subpar customer interactions, highlighting the importance of developing both technical and interpersonal skills in agents.

2. Agent Mastery Scores

Industry Trends

• The industry-wide Agent Mastery Score, which reflects the quality of live customer interactions, has declined for the third consecutive quarter, dropping from 53.3% in Q2 2024 to 51.1% in Q3 2024. This is the lowest result on record for Agent Mastery in any quarter.

• The decline in key competencies such as ENGAGE, DISCOVER, and ENERGY highlights growing concerns around soft skills among agents.

• Significant variability in performance underscores the need for focused training and greater consistency across employees. In Q3 2024, Agent Mastery scores ranged from 37.4% (Hume Bank) to 70.1% (Holmesglen TAFE).

Sector Trends

• Internet Retailers led the industry for the second consecutive quarter with a score of 55.4%. However, this marks a decline from 61.6% in Q2 2024, consistent with the overall drop in performance across the industry.

• Banks showed a marginal improvement from 44.4% to 44.7%, but still recorded the lowest score across all sectors for the second consecutive quarter.

With an industry average of just 51.1%, the data highlights the challenges organisations face in ensuring frontline employees are equipped with the necessary soft skills to provide high-quality interactions.

For instance, Name Use, one of the four ENGAGE Behaviours we measure, scored 29.1% in Q3, with the Council sector at just 3.2%, compared to Car Insurance Providers at 48.4%. This discrepancy emphasises the need for targeted training in key interaction behaviours.

3. Accessibility Rankings

Industry Trends

• The industry-wide Accessibility Ranking improved to 67.4% in Q3 2024, up from 65.1% in Q2 2024, marking the third consecutive quarter of improvement in 2024.

• This improvement is primarily attributed to reduced wait times, the third consecutive quarter of shorter wait times, along with a higher percentage of calls answered, which increased to a record 89.8%.

• The number of menu layers remained steady at 2.3 layers, while total message time saw a slight increase, rising from 37 to 38 seconds.

Sector Trends

• Education Providers led the industry for the second consecutive quarter, with an impressive 90.4%, representing the highest quarterly result for any sector since records commenced in August 2023.

• Banks, once again, ranked last, with a score of 44.6%, reflecting the ongoing challenges consumers face when trying to access a live agent for banking needs.

• As seen with other metrics, there is significant variation in Accessibility scores across the industry, ranging from a low of 4.4% (RACV Insurance) to a high of 97.7% (TasTAFE).

While many businesses are making strides in improving access to live agents, there remains a continuing trend of complex IVR menus, long forced messaging, and, in some cases, excessive wait times, all contributing to persistent customer frustrations.

As many of the scenarios we test involve new business opportunities, this trend suggests a loss of potential customers and damage to brand reputation due to a poor first impression.

4. Average Wait Times

Industry Trends

In good news for consumers, average wait times have decreased across the industry, now averaging 1:50 minutes, a reduction from 2:07 in Q3 2024, marking the third consecutive quarter of reduced wait times.

• The leading contact centres for Q3 2024 had an average wait time of just 3 seconds, with Dodo Internet and Optus Internet at the forefront. Dodo has now led the industry for four consecutive quarters in terms of wait times.

• Conversely, ING Bank recorded the longest average wait times for two consecutive quarters, suggesting ongoing systemic challenges in forecasting and meeting customer demand. Their wait time for new account and home loan enquiries was 6:44 minutes, though this is an improvement from the previous quarter’s 8:27 minutes. Despite this improvement, ING still holds the longest wait time in the industry.

Sector Highlights

• Education Providers delivered the best wait times in the industry for the first time, with an average of 30 seconds for new course enquiries.

• As expected, Banks had the longest wait times, with an average of 3:37 minutes for new account and home loan enquiries, ranging from 42 seconds (Great Southern Bank) to 6:44 minutes (ING Bank), the highest across all sectors we assess.

• Internet Retailers, ranked 2nd overall with an average wait time of 37 seconds, have successfully reduced wait times for four consecutive quarters, with several new entrants deliberately targeting low wait times as a competitive advantage.

For consumers, long wait times remain a primary frustration.

While many contact centres are delivering exceptionally short wait times, it’s worth noting that our testing primarily focuses on new business enquiries, which often receive different prioritisation compared to enquiries from existing customers.

As an industry, there is still much work to be done to help contact centre practitioners better forecast demand and influence business stakeholders to ensure they are provided with the necessary resources to meet that demand and articulate the positive ROI to the business.

5. Calls Answered

Industry Trends

The percentage of calls answered within our defined thresholds—10 minutes for sales enquiries and 15 minutes for customer service enquiries—improved to 89.8% in Q3 2024, up from 87.7% in Q2 2024. This marks the best-ever result recorded, with all sectors showing improvement, except for Energy Retailers.

Despite this strong industry performance, 11.1% of calls still went unanswered, representing a lost opportunity for businesses, particularly given that we are testing new business scenarios.

Results across the industry varied significantly, ranging from 41.1% (ING Bank), which failed to answer 58.9% of calls within 10 minutes for new account/home loan enquiries, to 58% of contact centres achieving a perfect 100%.

Only 14% of contact centres have achieved 100% in every quarter since the benchmarking began in August 2023, underscoring the difficulty in aligning forecasts with demand.

Sector Trends

• Education Providers were the only sector to achieve 100% in Q3 2024, marking only the second time any sector has achieved this milestone (the first being Energy Retailers in Q4 2023).

• Banks again had the lowest calls answered percentage, with 68.1%, and no bank achieved 100%. The highest for any bank was 94.4% (Bank Australia).

Given the significant efforts and investments made by marketing teams to generate new enquiries, it is concerning that some businesses consistently fail to answer calls within a reasonable time. This inefficiency presents a missed opportunity for new customer acquisition.

While it falls outside the scope of our mystery shopping benchmarking (as we must remain anonymous), the situation raises concerns for existing clients as well.

If new business calls—often prioritised—are going unanswered, it is concerning for customers trying to reach a live agent regarding their account, claims, or billing, etc.

Conclusion

The Q3 2024 report reveals several critical trends in customer experience (CX) across key sectors.

While improvements in Accessibility and Average Wait Times highlight positive shifts, the overall decline in Agent Mastery scores and the inconsistent performance across sectors underscore the ongoing challenges within the industry.

Despite improvements in accessibility, with Education Providers leading the way, significant performance disparities remain.

Notably, Banks continue to struggle with long wait times and low call-answering rates, impacting the customer experience.

This is especially concerning in the context of new business opportunities, where missed calls and long wait times represent lost opportunities for customer acquisition and potential revenue.

As the industry moves forward, it is clear that more work is needed to bridge the gap in Agent Mastery.

Soft skills such as empathy and engagement continue to decline, revealing the need for better agent training and development.

Furthermore, contact centre managers must be equipped with the right tools and support to forecast demand and influence business stakeholders, ensuring they are allocated sufficient resources to meet customer expectations.

Ultimately, while there are standout performers in the sector, the data indicates that significant improvements are required across the industry to deliver consistent, high-quality customer experiences and to meet the rising expectations of consumers in 2025.

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HIGHEST/LOWEST RANKINGS FOR Q3 2024 

The High/Low Rankings below provide a snapshot of the range of performance across the Australian Call Centre industry for eight selected metrics—just a small preview of the 80+ metrics available in our Contact Centre CX Benchmarking reports.

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Benchmarking Data for Other Industry Sectors

In addition to the overall industry and sector information we publish, you can also view specific benchmarking data for each industry sector we assess – click the links below to learn more and view data.