Glossary
Agent occupancy
Agent occupancy is the share of an agent's time on the line spent handling contacts: talking, keeping a customer on hold, or wrapping up after the call. The rest of the time on the line, the agent is available and waiting for the next contact. Low occupancy means you pay for idle time; too high, and agents burn out while queues grow.
Why it mattersLow occupancy means paying for idle time; too high means burnout and mistakes.
Also called: Occupancy, Agent occupancy rate, Occupancy rate, Agent utilization (often confused)
Occupancy = handle time / (handle time + available time) × 100%Handle time is talk time, hold time, and after-call work. Available time is when the agent is on the line, free, and waiting for a contact. Breaks, training, and meetings are not part of the formula.Example
Formula and example
An agent works an 8-hour shift. One hour goes to breaks and training, and the other 7 hours are spent on the line. Of those, 5.6 hours go to calls and after-call work, and 1.4 hours to waiting for the next call. Occupancy = 5.6 / (5.6 + 1.4) × 100% = 80%.
The hour of breaks and training isn't included in occupancy – that's shrinkage. Measured against the whole shift, contacts take up 5.6 of 8 hours, or 70%.
Comparison
Occupancy vs utilization
These two metrics are often confused. Agree on which one your reports show.
Benchmarks
What occupancy is healthy
You can't set occupancy directly: it results from contact volume, AHT, and the number of agents. Under the Erlang C formula, occupancy equals the workload in Erlangs divided by the number of agents: 10 Erlangs across 14 agents is about 71%.
The larger the team, the higher the occupancy for the same service level target. For a workload of 100 Erlangs, an 80/20 target (80% of calls in 20 seconds), and a 180-second handle time, the formula needs only 107 agents – but occupancy then hits 93%. That's why staffing is also checked against a maximum occupancy: with a 90% cap, you need 112 agents.
- 75-85% is the usual healthy range for calls
- Above 85-90% for long stretches leads to fatigue, mistakes, and turnover
- Below 65% usually means more people than needed, or a schedule that doesn't match call volume
- Idle time on the line can go to training, quality reviews, or outbound calls
In CONTACT.WORK
How it works in CONTACT.WORK
Real-time dashboards show current agent statuses, and historical reports show workload by agent and team. Reports break handle time into talk, hold, and after-call work, so you can see what drives occupancy. In the Erlang calculator, you can set a maximum occupancy: if agents would exceed it at your target service level, the calculator adds staff.
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Where to use it
Backlinks
Where it appears on the site 4
Services 1
Integrations 1
Calculators 1
Glossary