First call resolution for home-service office requests

01 / Check whether the request was completed

Before you choose the next step

For a home-service business, the practical starting point is a clearly labeled office-request measure. A customer asking for an appointment date needs a different outcome from a customer reporting equipment that needs an on-site inspection. Answering either call does not establish that the underlying repair is complete.

02 / Check whether the request was completed

Decide which request your measure describes

Write the eligible office-request categories before measuring the period. Examples might include questions about an existing appointment, permitted scheduling changes and administrative information your team can provide from an approved record.

Keep the measure's name honest: office-request first call resolution. Show the number and categories of requests outside that scope as well. Do not label this narrow result as the resolution rate for all customer problems or all service jobs.

A request that is eligible but difficult remains in the denominator. Needing a supervisor's decision or a later callback is an unresolved eligible request, not a convenient reason to exclude it. Change eligibility rules prospectively and record the change so comparisons remain meaningful.

03 / Check whether the request was completed

Define completion with observable evidence

Use a short rubric agreed by the office. These fictional examples illustrate possible rules:

For a call with multiple issues, record the issues individually or define a clear whole-call rule before counting. Otherwise a completed administrative question could conceal a second request that remains open.

04 / Check whether the request was completed

Check related contact without relying on silence

NiCE notes that organizations use combinations of customer confirmation, repeat-contact windows, disposition codes and interaction or CRM data to determine resolution. Choose a method your office can actually support, and document its limitations.

For this office worksheet, first check that the intended action or answer is evidenced in the authorized record. Then check whether related follow-up was required within your documented observation window. The absence of another call by itself is not proof that the request was completed.

Match follow-up to the same issue or request, not just to a phone number. A customer may call from another number; another person may use the same household number for an unrelated question. Preserve ambiguous matches for review rather than silently treating them as resolved.

If the observation window has not yet finished, mark the request provisional. Report provisional counts separately and compare cohorts that have had the same opportunity for follow-up. Do not make today's new requests look better merely because nobody has had time to call again.

05 / Check whether the request was completed

Calculate a clearly labeled cohort result

For the method described here:

Office-request FCR = eligible first requests verified as resolved on the first call, with the follow-up check complete ÷ all eligible first requests with the follow-up check complete × 100.

Suppose a fictional office has 40 eligible first requests in a fully observed cohort. Twenty-eight meet the completion rule and have no related repeat contact that invalidates resolution under the chosen policy. Its office-request FCR is 28 divided by 40, or 70%. This is a calculation example, not an industry benchmark, target or Revo result.

Show the 40-request denominator with the percentage. Also show the excluded and provisional counts, the request categories, the observation window and the evidence method. Use the same definitions in subsequent periods.

06 / Check whether the request was completed

Use the result to improve the office process

Review unresolved eligible requests by reason. Was a permitted action waiting for approval? Was the customer asking for a fact the office could not verify? Was an agreed handoff missing an owner? Identify a concrete issue before changing the workflow, then inspect the same type of request after the change.

Do not reward premature closure or discourage necessary follow-up simply to raise the percentage. NiCE warns that FCR targets can create those incentives. Accuracy, appropriate escalation and the actual customer outcome must remain part of review.