ontact Response Time Metrics
Contact Response Time is a measure of the percentage of customer-initiated messages that you respond to within 24 hours. Timely, high-quality responses to customer inquiries are an important factor in customer satisfaction. Our research shows that orders with messages responded to within 24 hours receive 50% less negative feedback compared to orders with messages responded to after more than 24 hours.
To better help you track your response times, we display a Contact Response Time performance indicator in the Performance Checklist on the Customer Metrics page. This is in addition to the Buyer-Seller Contact Response Time statistics displayed further down the page.
Measuring response time
To measure Contact Response Time, we look at all messages sent between you and a buyer both before and after an order is placed.
Note: You can flag a message as not requiring a response by checking the "Mark as no response needed" box in the Reply area of the communication thread. This will exclude the message from response-time calculations.
We calculate response time based on absolute time. Calculation is based on when a message is received and sent through the Amazon messaging system. We calculate the following for the preceding 7, 30, and 90 day periods:
Average response time: Of those messages that receive a response, this is the amount of time elapsed between the transmission of a customer message and the transmission of your response, including weekend days.
Response times under 24 hours: The percentage of messages responded to within 24 hours, including weekends.
Late responses: The percentage of messages not responded to within 24 hours, including weekends. For this metric, we have the following subcategories:
Response times over 24 hours: The number of messages that were responded to after 24 hours.
No response: The number of messages not yet responded to that were received more than 24 hours ago.
Response time report
To view a report of all recent messages that are awaiting responses, follow these steps:
Go to Customer Metrics, in the Performance area of your seller account.
Scroll to the bottom of the Buyer-Seller Contact Response Time table.
Click the link embedded in the following message, "You have [number] messages that you have not responded to in the past [number] days."
We do not advise that you use this report as the primary indicator of which messages to respond to. It is provided only as a way to double check that you haven’t overlooked any customer messages.
Frequently asked questions
What messages are included in Contact Response Time calculations?
Does my e-mail's auto-responder for new messages count as a response?
Are customers able to view my response time metrics?
What happens if my response time is "Fair" or "Poor"?
What messages are included in Contact Response Time calculations?
All messages from customers are included, whether sent before or after placing an order. Customer replies to your messages are also included.
Does my e-mail's auto-responder for new messages count as a response?
No. If your e-mail service automatically sends an acknowledgement upon receiving a message, we do not count that auto-reply as a response.
Are customers able to view my response time metrics?
No. Contact Response Time metrics are currently not displayed to customers. They are visible only to you through your seller account.
What happens if my response time is "Fair" or "Poor"?
Timely, high-quality responses to customer inquiries are an important factor in customer satisfaction and can help prevent negative feedback or other order defects and claims. While scores that do not meet our standards generally do not result in the suspension of your selling privileges, slow response times can lead to negative feedback and claims, which can impact your selling privileges.