Wellabe Customer Service: Expert Operational Guide

Executive summary

Wellabe customer service must be designed as a high-trust, measurable function that supports retention, reduces churn and converts support interactions into product insights. For a mid-market digital health/wellness brand serving 50,000–500,000 users, best practice is to operate a hybrid model: self-service knowledge base + 24/5 live channels + premium 24/7 support for enterprise customers. This document provides concrete targets, staffing heuristics, tooling recommendations and escalation patterns that deliver predictable results.

Targets used throughout are realistic operational benchmarks based on contemporary SaaS and consumer-health support models: first-response benchmarks, resolution targets, NPS/CSAT goals and per-agent throughput. Replace any specific numeric target with company-level tolerance where compliance or regulation (HIPAA, GDPR) requires different SLAs.

Channels, hours and tactical targets

Wellabe should offer three primary channels: phone, live chat and email/ticketing; plus a searchable knowledge base and in-app messaging for transactional alerts. Decide channel hours by segment: consumer tier (08:00–22:00 local time, 7 days) and enterprise tier (24/7). For telephony, use cloud voice (SIP) integrated with the ticketing system and provide CLID + call recordings stored for 90–365 days depending on retention policy.

Operational channel targets should be explicit and measured daily. Typical operational targets to adopt immediately are listed below; tune them after 90 days of real traffic analysis.

• Phone: Answer within 60 seconds (service level 80/60), abandon rate <5%, average handle time (AHT) 6–12 minutes.
• Live chat: First reply <60 seconds, concurrent chats per agent 3–5, chat conversion to ticket <10% for escalation.
• Email/ticket: First response <2 business hours for premium; <24 hours for standard. Median resolution <48 hours for non-escalated issues.
• Knowledge base: Self-serve containment target 35–55% (percentage of issues resolved without agent contact). Update cadence: review top 50 articles every 30 days.

KPIs, SLAs and performance targets

Define a small set of leading KPIs and one suite of lagging indicators. Leading indicators (response time, backlog size, number of reopened tickets) predict operational stress; lagging indicators (CSAT, NPS, churn impact) show business value. Set monthly cadence for KPI review and tie KPIs to compensation/incentives for senior managers.

The following KPI targets are practical for Wellabe in year 1–2 of scaling. Adjust targets by product complexity and regulatory requirements.

• Customer Satisfaction (CSAT): target ≥90% for premium, ≥85% for standard; measure after ticket close.
• Net Promoter Score (NPS): target +30 to +50 for a well-regarded health/wellness app within 18–24 months.
• First Contact Resolution (FCR): target ≥75–85% for transactional issues; lower for care-coordination or clinical escalation.
• Average resolution time: <24 hours for common issues, <72 hours for complex multi-team issues.
• Cost per contact: aim for $3–$8 per contact with self-serve and automation; expect $20–$50+ per phone interaction for human-assisted care coordination.

Staffing, training and quality assurance

Staffing ratio guidance: start with 1 full-time support agent per 400–600 active monthly users for a consumer-focused product; tighten to 1:150–1:250 for higher-touch health coaching or B2B accounts. Plan for 20% shrinkage (vacation, training, meetings) in capacity calculations. For a 100,000-user footprint this maps to ~170–250 agents if you support high-touch services; for a lean digital-only model expect 25–60 agents.

Onboarding: 40–80 hours onboarding per agent with 30% shadowing, roleplay and competency checks. Ongoing training: 2–4 hours weekly for product updates, clinical escalation refreshers and compliance. QA program: sample 8–12 cases per agent per month, score against a 15-item rubric (accuracy, empathy, SLA, compliance) and publish agent-level improvement plans monthly.

Tools, integrations and data governance

Choose a ticketing/CRM first (Zendesk, Freshdesk, Salesforce Service Cloud are common choices). Integrate telephony (Twilio, RingCentral), in-app messaging (Intercom, Braze), analytics (Looker, Tableau) and product telemetry (Amplitude, Mixpanel). Budget per-agent licensing: $25–$150 per agent/month depending on functionality; telephony & recording add $10–$30 per agent/month. Plan an initial tooling budget of $50–$120k/year for a 20-agent operation including integrations and reporting.

Data governance is critical: log access, encrypt in transit and at rest, and apply role-based access for PHI. Retention: keep support transcripts for 2–7 years based on regulatory constraints; anonymize or purge after retention period. Maintain an incident playbook and a quarterly penetration test if support tools access sensitive systems.

Escalation paths, pricing tiers and reporting

Define a clear three-level escalation matrix: Level 1 (triage and resolution within 24 hours), Level 2 (specialist involvement within 48–72 hours), Level 3 (product/clinical engineering with 72+ hour SLA or immediate hot-fix for critical incidents). Document time-to-escalate thresholds, ownership, and an on-call rota for Level 3. For enterprise customers, publish SLAs in contracts (e.g., 99.5% uptime + 2-hour incident acknowledgement for P1).

Support should be tiered in pricing: include basic email + KB in the product price; offer Standard support as an add-on ($3–6/user/month) with faster email response and chat; Premium or Enterprise support ($15–30/user/month or custom retainer $1,500–$10,000/month) should provide 24/7 phone, dedicated CSM and quarterly business reviews. Produce a standard monthly support report with volume, CSAT, FCR, backlog and top 10 issues; share executive summary with product and marketing stakeholders.

Practical scripts, contact templates and next steps

Provide agents with short, compliant templates for common scenarios: password reset, billing dispute, clinical referral, and outage notification. Example email subject formats: “Wellabe Support: [AccountID] – [Short Issue]” and ticket tags: severity:critical|billing|clinical|product. Keep templates under 140 words and include expected SLA and next steps.

Operational next steps for Wellabe: run a 90-day pilot with 3–5 full-time agents, instrument all channels, collect baseline KPIs, and iterate. Set a 12-month roadmap: scale staffing at +25–40% per quarter if volume increases, invest in automation for top 10 issue flows, and implement quarterly cross-functional reviews to reduce repeat contacts by 15–25% year-over-year.

Contact placeholders for operational planning: [email protected], www.wellabe.com/support. Use these as templates for internal documentation and replace with production endpoints once registries and privacy controls are validated.