Meet Bob! Bob has a question about FSA but can’t find their phone number.
After much searching, he calls and speaks with an FSA agent named Laura. Laura was
unable to answer his question or transfer him so she gives Bob a new number to call.
Bob calls that number and speaks with Ted. Ted is not an agent but a policy analyst and takes Bob’s
call regarding the basic question. While Bob was finally able to get his question answered,
he was frustrated he had to call multiple phone numbers.
USDA is committed to being the most customer-focused and customer
experience driven department in the federal government, but as seen through Bob’s situation,
it has faced several challenges when answering questions from the public.
USDA’s customers had limited self-service options on the USDA website.
In addition, each agency maintained its own contact center with multiple phone numbers
listed. This caused confusion and frustration as customers did not know which number to call.
Within Mission Areas and Agencies – there was no centralized reporting and analytics source.
Instead of general inquiries being quickly resolved by a trained agent, specialists were
handling all calls including general or basic inquiries which was not time or cost effective.
Overall, there was no single phone number or contact center to act as the one front door
for our customers. Additionally, there was no centralized technology or platform
to share information about public inquiries and our responses across USDA.
AskUSDA solves all these challenges. AskUSDA serves as the one front door for
USDA customers. It’s a contact center that answers general inquiries from the public
using trained agents and self-service options.
AskUSDA can transfer more complex inquires directly to mission area or agency specialists
as needed. This allows AskUSDA to deliver superior customer service and consistent
information to help ensure USDA remains the most effective, efficient, and customer-focused
department in the federal government. AskUSDA has 4 main objectives:
One, to create a single point of entry for USDA customers using a centralized contact center.
AskUSDA is staffed with full-time trained agents to answer customer questions from phone calls,
online forms, chats, and emails. Two, to offer a self-service platform
on the AskUSDA Website where thousands of help articles can be directly accessed by the public.
Three, to transform Customer Experience by improving processes for greater simplicity,
efficiency, and transparency. And four, to enable a data-driven
culture for customer experience so USDA can understand the 360-degree view of the customer.
So, how does AskUSDA deliver these objectives?
AskUSDA partners with existing contact centers to transform and modernize how they serve the public.
This includes collaborating with agencies to understand their needs for interacting
with the public and how AskUSDA’s people, processes, and technology can help support them.
The AskUSDA website contains thousands of help articles which gives customers
a self-service option – this is referred to as the Knowledge Base. Agents can also
use these documents to quickly resolve general inquiries from customers. To ensure relevancy
and accuracy, the articles are kept up-to-date by knowledge experts within each of the agencies.
Customers can use the channel of their choice: phone,
online form or live chat which provides a seamless experience. Each of these channels are staffed by
full-time AskUSDA agents who provide high levels of customer service to the general public.
AskUSDA conducts customer surveys across all its channels to collect, analyze,
and act on customer feedback. AskUSDA Dashboards allow leaders
to analyze and collect interactions, operational metrics, and survey data.
Let’s revisit Bob, Ted, and Laura and realize the many benefits of AskUSDA to customers,
the agencies and USDA. But first, let’s meet Jane, a trained AskUSDA agent.
Jane can help Bob quickly and efficiently using AskUSDA’s technology capabilities
and help articles. AskUSDA agents answer less complex questions across multiple channels and
agencies. If needed, Jane can transfer calls to agents within agencies like Laura.
With AskUSDA, Bob can choose from multiple channels:
phone, online form, chat, or self-service options on the AskUSDA website.
These channels are integrated between AskUSDA and Agencies allowing for consistent information
across channels, and self-help options. Laura the FSA agent is now able to focus
on more complex inquiries that are transferred from AskUSDA agents.
AskUSDA also allows for agency specialists like Ted to focus on delivering to their core mission.
AskUSDA enhances the level of customer service across USDA by
offering one front door for customer inquiries. AskUSDA continues to transform how customers
connect with the department, how agencies interact with customers, and how operations
and technology are standardized all in an effort to improve the customer experience at USDA.
The work we do at USDA is on behalf of our customers
and AskUSDA is another way we provide excellent customer experience.