Overview
When you set up queues in Contact Center Pro, it's important to choose the right routing strategy. This guide explains which routing strategies we recommend for your contact center and which ones to avoid, so you can reduce missed calls, improve reporting accuracy, and keep agents productive.
Who uses this feature
Administrators and managers
Applies to all business types
Applies to all trades
Feature configuration
Contact Center Pro is currently in Early Access and available for specific accounts. It is subject to change. If you want to enable this feature for your account, book a demo here.
Contact Center Pro requires an Enterprise Hub network. Contact your Customer Success Manager or Pro Account Manager to request a network.
The Edit Routing Workflows permission is required to use this feature. Please contact the account administrator on your team. For more, see Manage Contact Center Pro permissions.
Best practices
Use Longest Idle as your default routing strategy for most inbound queues, especially high-volume ones.
Avoid Simultaneous Ring on queues where more than one agent can take a call; it multiplies the issues with blocked calls and inaccurate reporting.
Staff for peak hours instead of ringing everyone at once. Make sure you have enough agents logged in and available during busy periods so calls are answered quickly without using a Simultaneous Ring.
For more, see Choose your routing strategy in Contact Center Pro.
Recommended setup: Longest Idle
Longest Idle is the recommended routing strategy in Contact Center Pro. Incoming calls are assigned to the agent who has been available the longest. If the agent rejects the call, it is routed to the next longest idle agent.
Longest Idle strategy benefits:
Routes calls directly to one available agent without blocking other incoming calls
Preserves call quality by using a single connection per call
Maintains accurate reporting–no inflated missed calls
Distributes workload evenly across agents
Supports features such as Force Away and queue skipping
Reduces unnecessary ringing and agent noise
For faster answer times, use Longest Idle and ensure adequate staffing during peak hours rather than using Simultaneous Ring.
Setup to avoid: Simultaneous Ring
Simultaneous Ring routes each incoming call to all available agents at the same time. The first agent to answer receives the call. While this may appear to improve speed to answer, it introduces significant operational and reporting issues.
Why to avoid Simultaneous Ring
Blocks other incoming calls
When a call is ringing to all available agents, those agents are considered "busy" and cannot receive additional calls. If you have 10 agents and one customer calls in, all 10 agents are tied up ringing for that single call. If a second customer calls a moment later, there are zero agents available to take it. This increases missed and abandoned calls during busy periods.
Impacts call quality
Simultaneous Ring creates multiple simultaneous connections per call, increasing network load. This puts extra strain on your network, especially during busy periods when multiple calls are triggering simultaneous rings at the same time.
The result can include:
Static or choppy audio on calls
Brief delays or gaps in conversation
Occasional dropped calls, especially for agents on slower internet connection
These issues are more likely in offices with remote or hybrid workers,
Creates uneven call distribution
Agents do not ring at the exact same time. Faster connections tend to answer first, which can lead to workload imbalance across the team. In some cases, agents with slower connections may not ring at all before the call is already answered by someone else.
Causes inaccurate reporting
When one agent answers, all other agents are marked as having missed the call. If you have 10 agents and one call comes in, nine of them will show a missed call in their stats — even though only one person could have answered it. Your missed call reports become inflated and don't reflect what actually happened. This inflates missed call metrics and makes it difficult to accurately measure:
Agent performance
True answer rates
Availability and workforce efficiency
Disables or limits key features
Simultaneous Ring is incompatible with several features that help your call center run smoothly:
Force Away does not function properly
Agents cannot reject calls
No visibility into which agent answered
Race conditions may cause call errors
Increases agent fatigue
Constant ringing for calls agents don't answer creates noise, distraction, and reduced accountability in high-volume environments.