Edgewater College
Contact Centre Worker Kaimahi Pokapū Whakapā
Contact centre workers answer enquiries and provide or organise help for those who contact them. They may also deal with customer complaints, or sell goods or services.
Contact centre workers may do some or all of the following:
- resolve customer enquiries and complaints
- provide information, advice or appointments to people who contact an organisation
- forward enquiries to relevant departments
- follow up enquiries by sending information
- ring customers to promote products or services
- conduct surveys
- provide feedback about customer experiences to managers.
Other duties vary according to where contact centre workers are employed. For example, those who work in ambulance centres may give first aid advice.
Physical Requirements
Contact centre workers need to have:
- clear speech
- good hearing.
Useful Experience
Useful experience for contact centre workers includes:
- customer service
- retail work with sales targets
- hospitality work
- reception and office work.
Personal Qualities
Contact centre workers need to be:
- able to relate to people from a range of cultures and backgrounds
- calm and patient, even when under pressure
- good communicators
- able to work well in a team
- able to maintain confidentiality.
Skills
Contact centre workers need to have:
- excellent speaking and listening skills
- excellent writing skills, to respond to enquiries through email, web chat, or letters
- good computer and data-entry skills
- knowledge of their organisation's products or services.
Conditions
Contact centre workers:
- may work full or part-time hours, during evenings, nights and weekends, and sometimes on rotating shifts
- work in contact centres or from reception desks, or work from home
- may work in stressful conditions – for example, in an emergency contact centre.
Subject Recommendations
No specific secondary education is required for this job, but business studies to at least NCEA Level 2 is useful.
Related Options
Contact Centre Workers can earn around $49K-$65K per year.
Pay for contact centre workers depends on their skills, experience and responsibilities, the type of contact centre they work for, and where in New Zealand they work.
- Contact centre workers usually earn $49,000 to $65,000 a year. Those working at home usually earn $49,000 to $60,000.
- Team leaders with more responsibilities can earn between $65,000 and $110,000 a year.
- Contact centre managers can earn between $90,000 and $200,000 a year.
Source: Madison, 'NZ Employment Market Report 2023', 2023.
Experienced contact centre workers can progress into team leader or supervisor roles, management, or other roles in their organisation.
Contact centre workers may specialise as emergency services call centre workers.
Years Of Training
There are no specific requirements to become a contact centre worker. A New Zealand Certificate in Contact Centres (Level 3 or 4) may be useful.
Free online course in contact centre skills
A free training course in contact centre skills is available for people who are out of work. It's funded by the Ministry of Social Development and includes support with devices, access, job hunting and interviews.
Find out more from the Customer Contact Network New Zealand (CCNNZ) website.
Emergency services
Emergency services (such as 111 phone calls) have specific training for people working in their communication centres. These workers may also need to undergo security checks and vision and hearing tests.
IGNITE Colleges arranges training for contact centre and emergency communications qualifications.
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