Individual Income Tax Contact Center Exceeds Industry Standard Benchmarks

The Michigan Department of Treasury’s Individual Income Tax (IIT) Contact Center exceeds many industry standards and has shown steady improvement since 2012, according to a new report by Purdue University.

The report from the Indiana-based education institution shows the IIT Contact Center staff improving first-time call resolutions from 77 percent in 2016-2017 to more than 85 percent in 2017. The report also shows the average speed of answering in-bound calls dropped from nearly 7 minutes in 2012-2013 to around 2 minutes in 2017.

Staff answered 11 calls per hour on average in 2017, which more than doubles a 4.75 calls per hour industry average, according to the report.

“This is a testament to continuous improvement our staff has been putting into the contact center,” said Scott Lonberger, director of Treasury’s Tax Processing Bureau. “We were above industry standard in many key areas and have already begun to work on some select areas where we can still improve.”

Purdue University maintains the largest database of contact center performance metrics in the United States. The Tax Processing Bureau commissioned the report to see how the IIT Contact Center was benchmarking against industry standards associated with more than 200 government contact centers.