What is intelligent routing (IR)?

Intelligent routing (IR), or skills-based routing, is a technology contact centers use to route customer queries that come in through voice, email, or chat channels to the agent best fit to resolve them.

Intelligent routing is a must-have feature for digitally transforming your contact center.

IR helps improve operational efficiency and elevate the customer experience. To provide seamless customer support, it is essential to route issues to suitable agents and queues the first time around. If done incorrectly, it could result in disgruntled customers.

Conversations can be routed based on the information collected about the customer, type of issue, language, and contact channel. Through IR, the right agent will get the customer’s details enabling them to provide personalized service.

How does intelligent routing work?

Intelligent routing uses caller input, current caller data, and historical caller data to determine where and with whom to connect callers for the best outcome.

Caller input – Through interaction with an interactive voice response (IVS) system, the caller provides essential information needed for proper routing. Intelligent routing uses this information to route the call based on an aggregate of circumstances, like customer intent, company priority in dealing with the caller, etc.
Current caller data – IR also identifies the number from which the call originated through automatic number identification (ANI) and uses dialed number identification service (DNIS) to determine the department where the caller should be transferred.
Historical caller data – after identifying the caller, IR systems gather information about the caller’s history of contacts, purchases, account status, customer support history, and more.

After this process, intelligent routing systems match data and criteria and connect the caller with a specific department, group, or individual relevant to the caller.