Handle time

Term name

Handle time

Purpose

Handle time helps teams understand how much time teammates spend working on a conversation before sending an outbound reply. It's a productivity metric — it reflects how long a reply takes to prepare, from clicking and viewing the conversation to sending it.

Definition

The time from when a teammate clicks and views a conversation to when they send an outbound reply.

• The timer starts when a teammate clicks and views a conversation, and keeps running the entire time the conversation is being worked on. This includes:

  • Time spent reading the conversation

  • Time spent drafting the reply

  • Time when the teammate isn't actively working in it, such as while idle, on a phone call, or working in another app or tab

• The timer stops when:

  • A reply is sent

  • The teammate clicks and views a different Front conversation

Example: If you view conversation A for 5 minutes, then view conversation B, but then return to conversation A and take 5 more minutes to send a reply, the first 5 minutes is counted. Conversation A's total handle time is 10 minutes.

Location & attribution

• Custom report

  • Line chart

  • Key metrics chart

  • Histogram chart

  • Table chart

• Message templates report

  • Message template details table - Attributed to the message template used.

• Resolution report

  • Key metrics chart

  • Resolution over time graph

  • Resolution by tag table

• Suggested replies report

  • Key metrics chart

  • Suggested replies over time graph

  • Suggested replies by teammate table

• Tags report

  • Tag Details table - Time is counted for a tag if currently labeled with the tag.

• Team performance report

  • Main metrics cards

  • Team performance table - Time is counted for the teammate who sent the message.

• Workload report

  • Key metrics chart

  • Workload over time graph

FAQ

• Handle time applies to replies and brand-new outbound messages.

• Handle time is not impacted by business hours or any shifts that teammate is on.

• Handle time is counted for a teammate even if they create a draft, delete it, create a new draft, and send it for the same conversation. Ex: Sophia starts a draft and works on it for 2 min then deletes it. She later starts a new draft and works on it for 5 min, then sends it. The handle time recorded will be 7 min.

• Handle time is only recorded when an outbound reply is sent. If no reply is sent, data is not recorded. Ex: If Hector views conversation A, reads it for 10 min and then moves on, handle time is not recorded.

• For shared drafts, only the sender's handle time is recorded. All handle times are tracked for each teammate separately, but only the handle time of the sender is recorded. Ex: Jamie and Michelle both work on a shared draft. Jamie works on it for 10 min before Michelle takes over the draft, works on it for 5 min and sends an outbound reply. The handle time recorded will be attributed to Michelle and will be 5 min.

• If multiple teammates draft and send separate replies to the same inbound message, each reply will have its own handle time. Ex: For the same inbound message, if Jane works on a draft for 2 min and sends it, then Sophia works on a new draft for 3 min and sends it, each handle time is recorded and attributed to the teammate who sent each draft.

• Each teammate who replies in a conversation, regardless of the official assignee of the conversation is tracked in analytics. If a conversation is assigned to Mary, but Sophia responds because she is unavailable, Sophia will get a reaction time, a reply time, and a handle time.

• Handle time is capped at 60 min, to eliminate outliers (computer goes to sleep, multiple tabs open, lunch break, etc.). If you take a 59 min lunch break, the best way to handle that is to look at another conversation and then go back to the initial one and start your draft.

• See this article for more examples in action.