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Your commission, your auditors or the Office for Civil Rights can ask how a single call went. These questions test whether a vendor can answer for it.
Ask how the vendor handles the calls a regulator can review: safety and medical calls, hardship and disconnection, protected health information, payments and non-English speakers. Then ask who scores calls and who they report to, where agents sit, how fast new agents reach your standard, and what you can audit. A good vendor backs each answer with a document.
A retailer's bad call costs a sale. Yours can end up in a commission report or a complaint to a federal agency.
In Pennsylvania, for example, each electric distribution company reports to the Public Utility Commission every year the percent of calls answered within 30 seconds, its busy-out rate and its call abandonment rate (52 Pa. Code 54.153). An outsourced queue counts toward those numbers.
And the people take time to get right. SQM Group (2023) found it takes six months or more for a new agent to perform like an average one.
| Ask | Why it matters | A good answer |
|---|---|---|
| Who scores calls, and who do they report to? | QA that reports to operations grades its own work | A QA team outside operations, with a scorecard you can see |
| How do new agents reach live calls? | New agents make the costly mistakes | Classroom training, exams, then supervised calls before working alone |
| Where will our agents sit, and can that change? | Data residency, state rules and customer expectations | The location written into the contract, changed only with your approval |
| What background checks do agents pass? | Agents see account and personal data | A written standard: criminal history, employment and identity checks |
| How are payments taken? | Card data brings PCI DSS duties | A current attestation of compliance, and card numbers kept out of call recordings |
| What can we audit, and how fast? | You answer for the vendor | Recordings, scorecards and complaint root causes on request |
| How do you plan for a surge on a date we know? | Volume spikes on storms, bill cycles and deadlines | A week-by-week ramp plan. See outage call staffing |
| Ask | Why it matters | A good answer |
|---|---|---|
| How does a downed-wire or gas call reach our emergency process? | Seconds count, and the address has to be right | A warm transfer with the address confirmed, tested before go-live |
| How do agents handle medical certificates? | Some states bar shutoff when a medical certificate is on file; Pennsylvania's rule forbids terminating or refusing to restore service when a qualifying certification is in place (52 Pa. Code 56.111) | Scripts written to your tariff and state rules, with a clear path to your staff |
| Who writes payment-arrangement and moratorium scripts? | Terms differ by commission and season | Scripts built from your tariff and reviewed before each season |
| Will you report to our commission metrics? | Your filings include the vendor's queues | Reports in the same definitions you file |
| Ask | Why it matters | A good answer |
|---|---|---|
| Will you sign our business associate agreement? | HIPAA requires one with set terms (45 CFR 164.504(e)) | Yes, covering breach reporting, subcontractors and return or destruction of records at exit |
| Do subcontractors touch our patients' data? | They must agree to the same restrictions | A named list, or none |
| How do you serve patients with limited English? | Covered entities must offer qualified interpreters, and critical machine translation needs human review (45 CFR 92.201) | Qualified interpreters by phone, and a rule against unreviewed machine translation |
| What happens when a caller asks a clinical question? | Non-clinical agents shouldn't give medical advice | A defined handoff to your clinical team |
| Do balance calls follow our financial assistance policy? | Billing calls can turn into collections | Agents screen for assistance before payment talk |
Patient contact center support shows how TSI sets these up for hospitals and medical groups.
Agents taking live calls in their first week.
QA that reports to the same manager as the floor.
"We'll figure out the location later."
No sample scorecard, recording or ramp plan until after you sign.
TSI's CXBPO team trains agents in a classroom on your products, scripts and the laws that apply, then puts them through stage-gate exams before supervised live calls. Call quality is scored by a team that reports to TSI's chief compliance officer. Agents clear a US background investigation with a 7-year county criminal search, and the delivery location goes in your contract.
CXBPO fits regulated, exception-heavy queues. For low-cost seats on general retail support, a high-volume generalist is likely the better fit.
A signed business associate agreement with the terms 45 CFR 164.504(e) requires, safeguards for electronic health information, breach reporting, controls on subcontractors and a plan to return or destroy records at contract end.
A common setup sends overflow and routine outage calls to a vendor and keeps emergency dispatch in-house. The vendor's job is to recognize a safety call and transfer it fast, with the address confirmed.
Score the same set of recorded calls from each vendor on your own scorecard, and ask who in their organization scores calls day to day.
It depends on your state rules, data terms and customers. Make the vendor write the location into the contract so it can't drift.
General information, current as of Nov 5, 2026. It isn't legal advice. Rules change and differ by state, so check the sources linked here and talk to your own counsel before you act on it.
The CX Surge Readiness Review is a 30 to 45 minute working session on your next dated surge, followed by a written readout with a week-by-week ramp outline and the gaps we found.
