A simple method to use Erlang C calculators to determine how many

Author(s): David Loia

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Lic

STEP 1: Go through the sheet below in and enter in your INPUTS in YELLOW CELLS.
STEP 2: Take the Output in the GREEN cell to the ErlnagC Calculator Sheet, and use the calculator to estimate

INPUTS IN YELLOW

Sources Page Views per day Unique Users

Online store product pages 9,000 3,000
Online store shopping cart pages 9,000 3,000
Support Product Description pages 6,000 2,000
"Have a Question?" on Home page 6,000 2,000
"Have a Question?" on Contact Us page 6,000 2,000
Misc. Pages 10,000 3,333
Shopping Cart Abandons - 1,500
46,000 16,833

Assumptions
Pages per Unique User
Chat Requests per Unique User
Accept rate for pushed chats
Hours of operation factor
Number of hours of chat operation
Acceptable delay (sec)
Number of concurrent chats per agent
Duration of average chat (sec)
Notes
3 ratio of product page views/ unique viewer
5% percentage of unique users requesting a chat (hittin
10% rate shopping cart abadons accept a pushed chat s
50% percentage of unique users during chat hours of op
4 Reduces "Total chats per day" column to "Chats/ho
20 For use in Erlang C calculator tab
3 For use in Erlang C calculator tab, not more than 5.
600 For use in Erlang C calculator tab
ors to determine how many chat agents needed in Customer Support.

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

n YELLOW CELLS.
or Sheet, and use the calculator to estimate the number of agents needed.

OUTPUT in Green Calculate in Erlang C Sheet

Chats pushed per period Chats per day Chats/hour during chat hours
- 75 19
- 75 19
- 50 13
- 50 13
- 50 13
- 83 21
1,500 38 9
1,500 421 105

of product page views/ unique viewer

entage of unique users requesting a chat (hitting the "chat now" button)
shopping cart abadons accept a pushed chat session
entage of unique users during chat hours of operation
uces "Total chats per day" column to "Chats/hour during chat hours" column
use in Erlang C calculator tab
use in Erlang C calculator tab, not more than 5.
use in Erlang C calculator tab
n Customer Support.

Max Chat Agents Rqr'ed (Using Erlang C sheet)

9
Erlang C calculates the number of agents needed for given assumptions in chats (calls) per hour, duration, and delay.

Step 1
Go to : http://www.erlang.com/calculator/erlc/

Step 2
- In "Calls per hour", put in the number of chats expected into the contact center
- In "Call Duration", put in the AHT of the typical chat session in seconds divided by the maximum number of concurrent chats
- in "Avg. Delay" set it to 5-15 seconds. The longer the acceptable delay, the fewer number of agents required.

Step 3

- push the "Calc" button

- change the assumptions, for instance chats per hour, and push "calc" again.
- push the "results" button to see a table of the last 20 iterations. For example:

Call
Calls per duration Avge Agents
hour (s) delay (s) required
80 200 20 7
90 200 20 8
100 200 20 9
110 200 20 9
120 200 20 10
130 200 20 10
ation, and delay.

mber of concurrent chats a typical agent can handle in this environment, suggest 2, not more than 3.