What Is It?
QA Acknowledgement & Appeals is a feature that allows Team Members to provide feedback on completed QA Reviews about them, driving strong post-QA Review feedback loops and more meaningful coaching.
Acknowledgement is a simple, one-click task for Team Members that lets managers/reviewers know that the Team Member has read and understands the contents of a QA Review. In a healthy QA program, agents are engaged with the QA process, meaning they don’t just skim QA reviews, but they actively read them, internalize Annotations/notes and put into practice the learnings moving forward while interacting with customers.
Appeals is the Stella Connect version of a QA workflow commonly called “disputes”. In this flow, agents are given the opportunity to provide feedback on QA reviews about them by indicating which questions/answers on the scorecard they would like a manager/reviewer to take a second look at. Allowing Team Members the opportunity to provide feedback on QA Reviews about them ensures that agents are engaged in the QA process and helps drive trust in the program long-term.
For teams that prefer not to use an Appeals process, we do offer the ability to use Acknowledgements Only (although we recommend using both!)
How Does It Work?
Once enabled, QA Acknowledgement & Appeals will add a Thumbs Up (Acknowledge) and Thumbs Down (Appeal) icon on each completed QA Review.
When a Team Member clicks the Thumbs Up (Acknowledge) button on a completed QA Review about them, we’ll mark the QA Review as Acknowledged. That’s it!
When a Team Member clicks the Thumbs Down (Appeal) button on a completed QA Review about them, we’ll kick off the Appeal flow. Here’s how it works:
After clicking the Appeal button, Team Members will see a button that says Appeal This Answer appear below each question/answer on the scorecard.
Clicking on the Appeal This Answer button will highlight the question and expose a text box where they will add their Reason for Appeal. The Team Member can select to appeal more than one question/answer in a QA Review, so we’ll keep count as they go, but the Reason for Appeal will be required for all questions they choose to Appeal before they can submit their appeal.
Once all appealed questions have their Reason for Appeal filled in, the Team Member can submit by clicking the Submit Appeal button in the top right-hand corner of the page.
The Team Member’s part is done, whether they’ve Acknowledged or Appealed, here’s what Team Leaders & Admins will experience moving forward.
All of the users selected to receive Appeals notifications (if users have been selected) will receive an email notification that links to the appealed review.
When a Team Leader or Admin views a completed QA Review, we will show either the Acknowledged or Appealed icon as highlighted at the top of the page if either has occurred.
If the review was Acknowledged by its reviewee, we’ll show the Thumbs Up icon highlighted.
If the review was Appealed, we’ll show the Thumbs Down icon highlighted, and each of the Appealed questions/answers on the scorecard will be highlighted with a yellow sidebar.
In order to resolve the appeal, the manager/reviewer should click the hamburger icon to the right of the QA score shown in the top right-hand corner of the page, and select Edit Score. Once selected, the reviewer will see a text box appear under each Appealed question/answer labeled Resolution to Appeal. Here, you can leave a note stating how you’ve decided to resolve this appeal. If you’d like to change the original answer, you should do it at this time, and leave a note stating what your original answer was, what you’ve changed it to, and why.
Sometimes, you’ll decide you don’t want to change the score based on the findings on the appeal. In these cases, you’ll still click Edit Score to expose the Resolution to Appeal text box. In this case, you’d probably want to leave a note stating that the score was not changed and why. You may also want to mention if you had a conversation with the Team Member or if you perhaps plan to talk about it in your next 1:1 with this agent.
Once all appropriate adjustments to answers are made, if necessary, and the Resolution to Appeal note is filled out for each appealed question/answer on the scorecard, you’ll save. Pro-tip: Save the QA Review by clicking the Save button at the top of the page. This ensures that if you’d like to discuss this review in Stella Connect 1:1s later, the review will be saved directly in your session’s Context Sidebar the next time you meet for a session with the reviewee.
On the QA Dashboard, head to the Completed Reviews tab. You’ll notice that we’ve added a few new details regarding Acknowledgements & Appeals.
We’ve added the Events filter, which will allow you to filter to Unacknowledged and Appealed QA Reviews.
Filtering to Unacknowledged will allow you to easily see all reviews that have not yet been acknowledged by their reviewees in the time period selected. This way, you can follow up with the reviewee, if necessary. Of course, you can click the Save button for any review on the Completed Reviews table, which will quickly add that QA Review to your next 1:1 session with the reviewee so you can add it to the session and reference it directly.
Filtering to Appealed in the Events filter will allow you to easily see all reviews that have been Appealed by their reviewee so they can be easily located and their progress can be tracked in a glance.
You’ll also find a new Events column in the Completed Reviews table at the bottom of the report. In the Events column, you’ll find a green Thumbs Up icon for each review that has been Acknowledged, and a yellow thumbs down icon for each review that has been Appealed.
We’ll show a status for each Appeal on the Completed Reviews table -- next to the Thumbs Down, you’ll see either Open or Closed.
Open indicates that the review has been Appealed, the reviewee has submitted the Reason for Appeal for each appealed question/answer on the scorecard, but no one has added a Resolution to Appeal yet.
Closed indicates that someone has reviewed the Appeal and added a Resolution to Appeal note, closing the Appeal.
Lastly, you’ll note that we’ve added a simple count of Appealed to the Total Reviews section of this report. That way, you can track the number of Appeals that have occurred in any given timeframe.
Enabling Acknowledgements & Appeals
Whether you want to enable Acknowledgements & Appeals or Acknowledgements Only, head to the QA Settings page. Once there, you’ll see toggles to enable the version you’d like to use -- move the toggle of the one you prefer into the on position, and we’ll do the rest.
If you’d like to send notifications for QA Appeals, head to the Notifications section of the QA Settings page. You’ll see the option to add users to the list to receive Appeals notifications. You can add as many as you’d like, but please note that they will all receive a notification for every Appeal, no matter who submitted it.
Once you’ve added users to the Appeals notification list, they’ll start receiving the emails - no further action necessary!