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Refusal Conversions and Timing of the Call

In the previous post, I talked about an interesting problem that a call scheduling experiment produced in relationship to refusal conversions. In the experiment, calls prior to a first refusal were more efficient under the experimental algorithm. But calls after the refusal were less efficient (in terms of contact) such that the experimental condition was only as efficient as the control when looking at call pre- and post-first refusal. Ouch.

My question is: what can be done to change the call scheduling of calls after the refusal to improve their efficiency? My colleagues here in Survey Research Operations suggested that calling back at the same time as the first refusal might be bad. You might get the same person.

For that to be the case, it seems as if the person who refused would have to screening their calls. While the control algorithm calls back at different times and finds someone else at home.

As a test of this hypothesis, I changed the algorithm to put the window in which the first refusal was taken at the bottom of the list. In other words, avoid calling at the window in which the first refusal was taken. We'll see how or if this works...
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  1. Andy PeytchevJuly 2, 2010 at 12:50 PM

    Very interesting, James. Do update next month if you can...
    Do you have difficulty implementing these changes to the call algorithm? I have refrained from asking for changes beyond the first call attempt for now.

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  2. James WagnerJuly 2, 2010 at 9:45 PM

    We have the sample management system set up to take as an input a set of files that I create on a daily basis. The SMS then updates the prioritization for each window/time zone combination.

    I have an automated process that creates my inputs files (the prioritization). I reprogrammed it to make this change.

    I'm thinking that things other than the timing of the call are more important -- the interviewer, incentive, etc. But it's still weird that I'm getting this result (less efficiency in the refusal conversion part).

    ReplyDelete

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