Australian Contact Centre CX Standards

The Contact Centre CX Standards provide a national framework for defining and measuring what good looks like in Australian contact centres – balancing technical efficiency with human connection.

Developed by ACXPA, these standards form the foundation for consistent, high-quality customer experiences.

Whether you’re aiming to improve agent conversations, reduce customer effort, or rank among Australia’s best, this is where it all begins.

What Are the Contact Centre CX Standards?

The Australian Contact Centre CX Standards are a proven, practical framework for defining and measuring customer experience in contact centres – designed specifically for the Australian market. Created by ACXPA, they provide a consistent and credible way to evaluate performance, whether you’re benchmarking externally or improving internally.

They focus on two areas that matter most to customers:

Agent Mastery – The soft skills and behaviours that drive high-quality, human conversations.
Accessibility – The ease and effort required for a customer to reach a live person.

These two components form the backbone of our Call Centre Rankings and Contact Centre CX Benchmarking Program, giving every centre – no matter the industry or structure – a fair and transparent way to assess how well they’re really doing.

“But Our Business Is Different…”

We hear it often – and it’s true, every business is different. But great contact centre experiences share the same foundations: human connection, clear communication, and efficient service. The Contact Centre CX Standards were designed with this in mind.

Whether you’re handling inbound sales, technical support, account inquiries, or general customer service, the behaviours that drive customer satisfaction are the same. What changes is how you apply them – based on your brand voice, sector, and customer expectations.

These standards don’t dictate how you operate. Instead, they give you a flexible, evidence-based framework to define what good looks and sounds like for your team – regardless of your industry.

How the Standards Are Measured

The Contact Centre CX Standards are used to calculate a single, powerful performance metric: your Overall CX Score. This score reflects how well your contact centre delivers a complete customer experience – across both process and people.

The Overall CX Score is made up of two weighted components:

Agent Mastery – 70% of the score. A structured evaluation of soft skills and behaviours across five core competencies and 18 measurable call-handling behaviours.
Accessibility – 30% of the score. A data-driven assessment of how easy it is for customers to reach a live agent, based on 48 individual metrics across five categories.

Together, these components create the Overall CX Score used in our Call Centre Rankings and CX Benchmarking Program.

But it’s not just about what you do well. We also apply deductions for significant customer pain points – issues serious enough to undermine the overall experience, regardless of otherwise strong performance.

Excessive wait times leading to an inability to connect with a live agent
Being disconnected due to a technical failure
Refusal to offer the option to connect to a live agent

Even if most elements perform well, these critical breakdowns carry heavier penalties to ensure the score reflects real-world customer impact.

Agent Mastery
70%

Accessibility
30%

–

Deductions
Significant Issues

Overall CX
Score

Deductions are applied when significant issues occur – like being disconnected mid-call or pushing customers away from help.

Why Is Agent Mastery Weighted More Heavily?

While both components of the CX Standards are critical, Agent Mastery carries more weight (70%) because it represents the actual customer interaction – where trust is built, problems are solved, and the brand experience is delivered.

You can have the best IVR or lowest wait times, but if the conversation with the agent doesn’t land, the experience suffers. That’s why more emphasis is placed on how well agents connect, communicate, and deliver outcomes.

Accessibility still plays a vital role – after all, customers can’t be helped if they can’t get through. But once they do, what happens during the call is what matters most.

How We Measure Agent Mastery

Agent Mastery is the human side of the Contact Centre CX Standards. It measures the quality of the conversation – how effectively your agents connect with customers, manage the interaction, and deliver positive outcomes.

It’s not about ticking compliance boxes or sticking to a rigid script. It’s about assessing what truly matters in a customer interaction: communication, confidence, empathy and clarity – delivered consistently across your team.

While your industry, call types or branding may vary, the foundations of great service do not. These standards are universally applicable across every sector – from government and utilities to sales, support and everything in between.

We use five core competencies and 18 observable behaviours to bring structure, alignment, and a clear benchmark for what great performance looks like.

The Five Core Agent Mastery Competencies

1. ENGAGE – First impressions and ownership

Definition: Create a strong first impression and build trust by demonstrating ownership, personalising the interaction, and setting the stage for a successful conversation.

This moment sets the tone—it’s where confidence, professionalism and warmth begin to shape the customer’s perception.

Welcome – Deliver a vibrant, natural introduction that sets a positive tone.
Intent – Use definitive statements to establish confidence and ownership.
Name – Seek and use the customer’s name to personalise the interaction.
Bridge – Clearly outline how you’ll assist, building customer confidence.

2. DISCOVER – Understanding customer needs

Definition: Understand and explore customer needs by driving open conversations and actively listening to uncover their goals and concerns.

This competency reflects your ability to stay curious—digging beneath the surface to get clarity on what customers truly want and need.

Converse – Encourage customers to share their needs and objectives.
Listen – Demonstrate active listening to show the customer they’re heard.
Confirm – Identify and validate key needs to ensure alignment and clarity.

3. EDUCATE – Inform and empower the customer

Definition: Provide targeted, relevant information that builds understanding and ensures customers feel informed, confident, and ready to act.

This competency highlights your ability to explain with clarity—removing confusion and empowering the customer to make decisions with confidence.

Inform – Present relevant information tailored to customer needs.
Checks – Regularly check for understanding and suitability.
Seek – Confirm the customer’s readiness to proceed or achieve resolution.
Confidence – Communicate product or service details clearly and confidently.

4. CLOSE – End strong with clarity and care

Definition: Conclude interactions with a strong final check, express gratitude, and leave a lasting positive impression.

The final moments of a call matter—this is your chance to reinforce confidence, eliminate doubt, and finish the conversation on a high note.

Check – Proactively initiate the close of the call with a strong check for any final questions.
Gratitude – Show appreciation for the customer’s time, patience, or consideration of your product or service.
Farewell – Deliver a warm and simple farewell that triggers a confident conclusion to the call.

5. IMPACT – Consistency, empathy and control

Definition: Build a strong connection and seamless experience through effective communication and engagement.

This is the emotional engine room—where tone, empathy and control create lasting impressions and turn good service into great CX.

Vibrancy – Use a consistently vibrant and natural tone to show warmth, interest, and care.
Empathy – Acknowledge and validate the customer’s needs, concerns, or objections.
Control – Maintain proactive control of the call with efficient management and transparency.
Clarity – Use clear language and appropriate pacing to enhance understanding.

How We Measure Accessibility

Accessibility is the practical side of the Contact Centre CX Standards – how easily customers can reach a live agent when they need one.
Whether it’s a sales enquiry, general enquiry or a support request, we assess the steps required to connect with a human – without being blocked, delayed or pushed away.

These aren’t compliance metrics. We’re not just checking if you offer contact options – we’re assessing if those options are clear, efficient, and human-friendly.
We apply the same criteria across all industries to draw a clear line in the sand: this is what ‘good’ looks like.

Self-service plays a role, but if a customer has chosen to call, we expect the experience to support that intent – not divert it.
That includes measuring the IVR design, audio quality, queue experience and more, based on real-world scenarios that involve connecting with a live agent.

Search

How easy is it for a customer to find your contact number? We assess whether it's listed on Google, clearly accessible on your website, and how many clicks it takes to get there.

Design

We evaluate whether your IVR is structured for simplicity and efficiency. This includes the number of layers, how many options are presented, the presence of redundant or excessive messages, and whether customers are advised of queue wait times.

Ease

Do the options make sense from a customer’s perspective? We assess how clearly the menus guide the caller, whether all selections are accepted, and if customers can progress through the system without confusion or dead-ends.

Audio

We assess the professionalism of your voiceovers – is the tone warm, the volume consistent, and the messaging concise? Every detail impacts how the customer feels before the call even begins.

Timing

Time is critical. We measure how long it takes to reach an agent – including the time spent navigating menus, listening to messages, and waiting in a queue.

Deductions

We apply penalties for excessive wait times, repetitive prompts, missing options for new customers, or pushing people toward digital channels when they clearly want to speak to a person.

How the Contact Centre CX Standards Are Used

The Contact Centre CX Standards aren’t just a framework — they’re actively used across the industry to drive performance, accountability, and measurable improvement.

Benchmarking: The standards form the foundation of our CX Benchmarking Programs, allowing organisations to see how they stack up against others in their sector and gain insights that help improve performance.
Call Centre Rankings: Every monthly ranking — from the best-performing contact centres to top-performing sectors — is based entirely on the Contact Centre CX Standards.
Training & Coaching: The standards give leaders and trainers a crystal-clear way to define “what good looks like” and to coach consistently across teams.
Internal QA Alignment: Many contact centres are adopting these standards as part of their internal QA model — complementing compliance metrics and creating alignment between internal targets and external benchmarking.
Customer Experience Strategy: Because the standards measure both human connection and ease of access, they’re helping organisations shape better end-to-end experiences.

Take Action with the Contact Centre CX Standards

The Contact Centre CX Standards don’t just provide a benchmark – they provide a path. Whether you're looking to understand how your sector is performing, assess your own contact centre, or improve frontline capability, these resources can help you put the Standards into action.