Forecasted vs actual – Assembled

Plans and permissions:

View and export the Forecasted vs actual report: Admin, Manager, Team Lead, or Standard role, or a custom role with Support volume forecasted vs. actual set to Can view and export

Use the Forecasted vs actual report to check how your staffing plan held up, interval by interval. It compares what your forecast expected, such as volume and handle time, with what actually happened, so you can see when you missed service level and which planning inputs to change next time.

To open it, go to Report > Support volume and select the Forecasted vs actual tab.

How the report works

The report looks at one forecast at a time, so you must select a single channel. If you forecast and staff by queue, filter to that queue too, so the report matches the level you plan at.
You can’t filter by site or team. Volume is tied to channels and queues, and a case is only linked to a team once it’s assigned to someone, after the point this report measures.
To see how sites or teams performed on assigned cases, use Team performance.
The report updates on a schedule rather than instantly, and the note at the top of the page shows when. See Data update times in reports.
Selecting a value to see its cases always shows the latest data.
The metrics you choose to show are saved for you only. Other people at your company can show different metrics.

Read the chart

Choose a date range, Schedule, Channel, and, under Add filter, a queue. Then choose an Interval.
Choose a metric from the dropdown at the top left of the chart. The chart opens on Cases opened or Contacts received, depending on the channel.

The dashed line shows what was forecasted for each interval, and the solid line shows what actually happened. Some difference is normal; large or repeated gaps are worth acting on. To improve your forecast, review your forecast settings and add outliers or adjustments in Forecast > Manage forecasts.

Forecasted vs actual report for the Email channel this week, with the forecasted (dashed) and actual (solid) Cases opened lines by hour. Numbered callouts mark the date range, Schedule, Channel, and Add filter controls with the Interval dropdown below them (1), and the metric dropdown at the top left of the chart (2); the chart legend is boxed.

Read the table

The table has one row per interval. Read each row from left to right:

Did you meet service level in this interval?
How did your plan hold up? Compare volume, efficiency, and scheduled staffing with what your forecast expected and recommended.

Each metric column shows the forecasted value next to the actual value. The rows at the bottom show the Average, Minimum, Maximum, and Sum for the filtered period, where they make sense for the metric. Select a metric’s column header to show that metric in the chart.

Interval-level table with Forecast and Actual columns for each metric, one row per hour, and a tooltip over a linked actual value. Numbered callouts mark the Average, Minimum, Maximum, and Sum rows at the bottom (1) and the Cases opened column header with the chart icon (2).

To choose which metrics appear, select Select metrics at the top right, select or clear metrics, and save your changes.

Select metrics to display window over the report, with a metric search box, Select all and Deselect all, a checklist of metrics, and Save changes. A numbered callout marks the Select metrics button (1); the search box and checklist are boxed.

See the cases behind a value

Many actual values in the table are links. Select one to open a side panel listing the cases included in that interval’s value.

Expand Show calculation details, where available, to see the settings and integration details behind the calculation. To change any of those settings, contact our team.
Search for a case by ID, or select Download to save the list for that interval and your filters as a CSV file.

Cases solved side panel for one hourly interval, listing the case IDs and queues used to calculate the metric. Numbered callouts mark the linked actual value in the table (1), Show calculation details (2), and the Download button (3).

Case activity timeline

For handle time, messages sent, and cases solved, the side panel can also open a case activity timeline for each case, which shows how the case’s status, handle time, and messages add up to the metric. To turn it on, contact our team.

Export the report

Select Export, then To CSV or To Google Sheets.
Choose the start and end times, the interval, and the channel and queues to include.
Select Export.

For Google Sheets, including recurring exports, see Google Sheets exports. To export the cases behind one value instead, use Download in its side panel.

Export forecasts and actuals window, opened from Export > To CSV, with Start time, End time, Interval, Channel, and Queues fields and an Export button. The Export menu button and the date range and interval fields are boxed.

Report metrics

For more case and service level metrics, see Case resolution and response metrics.

Metric	What it means
Service level	The percentage of contacts whose first response met the target response time in your staffing parameters for the channel and queue. Contacts without a first response aren’t counted.
Service level met	Contacts responded to within your target response time.
Service level missed	Contacts responded to after your target response time.
Occupancy	The percentage of available and occupied time that team members spent actively working on customer issues. For example, a team member who’s available or occupied for 8 hours, and on calls or in wrap-up for 6 of them, has 75% occupancy. See Occupancy.
Scheduled staffing	The staffing scheduled for the channel in each interval, from team schedules on the Staffing timeline.
Required staffing	The staffing needed to meet your service level goals. The forecasted value uses your forecast; the actual value uses the volume that arrived.
Net staffing	Scheduled staffing minus actual required staffing.

Channel-specific metrics

Metric	Channels	What it means
Contacts received	Phone, chat	The number of calls or chats that came in during the interval.
Avg. time to answer	Phone	The average time a customer waited to talk to a team member.
Handle time	Phone, chat, SMS	The average time a team member spent directly with the customer. Waiting time before the customer is connected and wrap-up time aren’t included.
First response	Chat, email	The average time a chat or email waited for its first response.
Cases opened	Email	Email cases created during the interval.
Cases reopened	Email	Email cases that moved from a responded status (such as solved, closed, or done) back to an unresponded status (such as new or open).
Cases solved	Email	Email cases that moved from an unsolved status, such as new, open, or pending, to solved or closed during the interval. Every solve counts, including when a reopened case is solved again. If your company counts pending Zendesk tickets as solved, moving a ticket to pending is the solve instead. If your channel uses the case lifecycle model, cases are counted by their last unit of work, and your company’s solve settings apply.