Did you know? Customers are set to waste over 900 million hours waiting on hold. On average, a person spends 43 days of their life on hold. When you break it down, that’s the equivalent of taking a long sabbatical. Yet, for many consumers, this is an everyday reality.
So, how long is too long on hold, and why does it matter so much to customer experience? The reality is that even short delays can quickly turn into frustration. As wait times extend, customers lose patience, abandon calls, and leave with a negative perception of the brand. For businesses, this goes far beyond momentary inconvenience. Long hold times directly impact loyalty, retention, and repeat engagement. Managing hold times is no longer optional. It has become a critical lever for protecting customer satisfaction, strengthening Net Promoter Scores, and supporting sustainable business growth.
In this article, we’ll explore how excessive hold times harm customer relationships and provide practical, data-backed strategies to reduce wait times, improve service efficiency, and ensure your customers never feel left waiting.
Hold time refers to the duration a customer spends waiting on the phone before speaking with a representative. This time is critical because it directly affects customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, and business outcomes.
The formula to calculate average hold time is:
Average Hold Time (AHT)= Total Hold Time/ Number of Calls Handled
Where:
In traditional call center models, hold time can vary depending on factors such as call volume, agent availability, and routing efficiency. Customers can also opt for a callback, which often leads to an increase in their tolerance for wait time, as it removes the stress of waiting in line. This is particularly important since most of the customers will abandon the call after long waits, and won’t wait more than two minutes.
To measure the impact of hold time on customer satisfaction, businesses can use a Call Abandonment Rate formula:
Call Abandonment Rate= Abandoned Calls/ Total Calls Received ×100
Reducing hold time is essential for minimizing abandonment and improving Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT). Additionally, it plays a significant role in enhancing Net Promoter Scores (NPS), which is a key indicator of customer loyalty:
NPS=%Promoters−%Detractors
Ultimately, optimizing hold times, whether by adjusting staffing levels, improving call routing, or adopting other strategies, leads to higher customer retention, better service delivery, and more favorable business outcomes.
The causes of prolonged hold times often stem from a combination of systemic inefficiencies and missed opportunities for optimization. Below, we delve into the key factors that contribute to excessive hold times, providing a data-driven perspective on how each can be addressed.
Ineffective or outdated call routing is a primary driver of extended hold times in contact centers. Traditional systems often route calls based on broad categories (e.g., sales, support, billing) without taking customer context or real-time agent availability into account. This results in customers being sent to the wrong agents, forcing them to be transferred multiple times, which increases hold time and causes frustration.
Modern Intelligent Call Routing systems, powered by AI and real-time data analytics, can route calls to the best available agent based on a customer’s profile, issue type, and even their interaction history. This reduces unnecessary transfers and ensures that calls are handled by the right representative from the start. A report by Gartner found that AI-based routing can reduce call handling time by 30%, leading to significant reductions in hold time.
Staffing shortages, particularly during peak times, are another significant factor in long hold times. Poor forecasting, where call volumes are not accurately predicted, leads to underscheduling, leaving contact centers understaffed when demand spikes. During high-demand periods, such as holidays or product launches, insufficient staffing means longer wait times for customers.
To address this, businesses need to implement AI-driven workforce management tools that use historical data and predictive analytics to forecast call volume patterns more accurately. These tools allow for dynamic staffing adjustments, ensuring the right number of agents are scheduled at peak times to maintain optimal service levels and reduce hold times. In fact, companies using advanced forecasting have reported a 40% reduction in missed SLAs, which directly correlates with reduced hold time.
The absence of effective self-service options significantly contributes to higher call volumes and longer wait times. Customers often call in for simple tasks like checking their account balance or resetting a password that could easily be handled through Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, web portals, or chatbots. Additionally, offering customers the ability to resolve common queries quickly improves satisfaction, as 80% of customers prefer self-service for routine tasks.
Implementing robust self-service capabilities such as AI-powered chatbots or an intuitive IVR can reduce inbound call volumes by up to 30-40%, freeing up agents to focus on more complex issues.
Even when a customer is routed to the correct agent, inefficient workflows and a lack of access to real-time information can prolong hold times. Agents may need to place customers on hold to search for information, consult with other departments, or manually update customer records. This not only increases the time spent on each call but also detracts from the overall customer experience.
Equipping agents with a unified Knowledge Management System and Customer Relationship Management tools can significantly reduce these delays. A KMS provides agents with instant access to a comprehensive knowledge base, enabling them to resolve queries in real-time. Similarly, a well-integrated CRM enables agents to view customer profiles, interaction histories, and service history, allowing for faster and more informed resolutions. Research found that 50% of agents spend less than 5 minutes searching for information during calls when using a well-integrated KMS, cutting hold times significantly.
| Root Cause | Operational Impact | Modern Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Inefficient call routing | Multiple transfers and longer queues | Intent-based AI routing |
| Poor forecasting | Understaffed peak hours | AI-driven volume prediction |
| No self-service | High inbound call volume | Automated voice self-service |
| Manual workflows | Agents placed on hold during calls | CRM and knowledge integrations |
Here are several proven strategies to reduce hold times and improve the overall customer experience:
Smart routing is one of the most powerful strategies to minimize hold time. By utilizing AI, smart routing ensures that customers are directed to the best available agent based on their specific needs. It eliminates the inefficiency of traditional call routing, where customers may get passed around multiple agents before reaching the right person.
With AI-powered systems, calls are immediately routed to an agent with the correct expertise, reducing unnecessary delays and ensuring a quicker resolution. It’s an approach that not only improves customer satisfaction but also helps businesses streamline their operations.
With CallBotics, around 80% of incoming calls are fully automated through advanced AI capabilities, enabling instant resolution without the need for live agent intervention. The remaining high-value or complex calls are intelligently routed based on intent, context, and required expertise to the most suitable live agent with full conversation history and context. This smart, skill-based routing drastically reduces Average Hold Time (AHT) and elevates First Call Resolution (FCR), ensuring faster, more efficient, and more personalized customer experiences.
No one enjoys being stuck on hold, especially when the wait stretches on indefinitely. That’s where callback options come in. Allowing customers to opt for a callback lets them carry on with their day while ensuring they don’t lose their place in the queue. This not only prevents frustration but also increases the likelihood of retaining customers who might otherwise abandon their calls.
With CallBotics, around 80% of calls are automated through AI voice agents. For the remaining 20% that require a live agent, if all agents are currently busy, customers can easily opt for a callback at their preferred time. This ensures they retain their position in the queue, experience zero frustration from long hold times, and enjoy a seamless, human-assisted resolution when the next expert becomes available.
One of the best ways to reduce hold time is to let customers handle simple issues themselves. Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, chatbots, and automated solutions allow customers to resolve basic queries like account balances, order statuses, or payment information without needing to speak to an agent.
Self-service technology frees up agents to handle more complex issues, ultimately improving service speed and satisfaction. It’s an effective way to improve operational efficiency while giving customers greater control over their experience.
💡Pro Tip: Leveraging CallBotics for self-service tasks takes automation a step further. With pre-trained workflows tailored to industry-specific needs, CallBotics automates both routine and complex inquiries, allowing customers to resolve issues and eliminate hold times.
A core reason for long hold times is simply insufficient staffing during peak periods. Poor forecasting can lead to inadequate agent coverage when call volumes spike, leading to long wait times. Forrester reports that businesses using AI-driven forecasting have reduced missed SLAs by 40%, ensuring optimal staffing during busy times and minimizing the need for customers to wait.
Businesses can significantly reduce hold times and increase first-call resolution rates by aligning agent availability with real-time demand. AI-powered workforce management tools can predict call volume patterns and help businesses schedule agents accordingly, ensuring that there are always enough agents available to handle customer inquiries.
With CallBotics, you gain access to real-time analytics that can continuously monitor your call center’s performance, including agent productivity and customer wait times. This allows you to proactively adjust staffing levels based on predicted call volumes, ensuring that agents are allocated efficiently.
Another highly effective strategy to eliminate hold time is to automate routine inquiries. Calls regarding simple topics like billing inquiries, order status checks, or appointment scheduling can often be handled by automated systems, allowing agents to focus on more complex or urgent matters.
Automation of these repetitive tasks can reduce operational costs by 65-90% and cut hold times by up to 80%. This approach not only frees up agents to handle more pressing issues but also improves overall call center efficiency.
With automated call handling and multi-channel support, CallBotics reduces agent workload, freeing up valuable resources for more complicated inquiries. This level of automation can help businesses eliminate hold times by up to 80%, depending on issues, while improving customer experience through faster resolutions.
Real-time analytics provide valuable insights into call center performance, allowing managers to make immediate adjustments to staffing or call routing based on current demand. For instance, if call volumes spike unexpectedly, real-time monitoring allows businesses to adjust staffing levels or reroute calls to available agents quickly, preventing long wait times from accumulating.
With CallBotics, real-time data isn’t just for tracking call volume; it’s actively used to adjust call handling and staffing in real time. This means better allocation of resources, quicker response times, and reduced delays in service, all of which directly impact hold times.
In the call center industry, hold time has a direct impact on both operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. As customer expectations continue to rise, tolerance for long waits has sharply declined. Prolonged hold times have become a critical failure point, driving call abandonment and eroding brand trust.
Reducing hold time is not just about shortening queues. It requires building a responsive operating model where volume surges, fluctuating demand, and agent availability are handled intelligently.
Built from inside the contact center world by teams with over 17 years of operational experience, CallBotics delivers an AI-driven approach to reducing hold time at scale. By automating and resolving around 80% of inbound calls through intelligent routing, real-time analytics, and smart callback automation, CallBotics helps enterprises reduce wait times, improve first-call resolution, and optimize workforce utilization while maintaining a consistent customer experience.
For contact centers facing high abandonment rates, seasonal spikes, or the need to balance personalization with scale, CallBotics offers a plug-and-play solution that can be implemented with minimal disruption and delivers measurable impact in a matter of days.
Urza Dey (She/They) is a content/copywriter who has been working in the industry for over 5 years now. They have strategized content for multiple brands in marketing, B2B SaaS, HealthTech, EdTech, and more. They like reading, metal music, watching horror films, and talking about magical occult practices.
CallBotics is the world’s first human-like AI voice platform for enterprises. Our AI voice agents automate calls at scale, enabling fast, natural, and reliable conversations that reduce costs, increase efficiency, and deploy in 48 hours.
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