PANDEMICS, FAFSA DELAYS, AND MORE: HOW UNLV OFFERED POSITIVE STUDENT EXPERIENCES DURING DIFFICULT TIMES
For many higher ed financial aid offices across the country, the past few years produced challenging timelines and unforeseen obstacles. Between the COVID-19 pandemic, staffing shortages, budget constraints, and a new FAFSA rollout, the University of Las Vegas (UNLV), staff needed help to keep up with the volume of work.
“People had already been working hard through the pandemic,” said Zack Goodwin, UNLV’s Executive Director of Financial Aid & Scholarships and Financial Literacy & Wellness. “In 2024, there were issues with the FAFSA. Often the FAFSA application cycle might be as long as nine to ten months prior to the start of the school year. But because of the delays, it's been closer to a three to four-month cycle. And this contributed to a lot of burnout among aid professionals.”
UNLV BY THE NUMBERS
In 2023, ECSI's CXSelect Advocates handled 64,039 queued calls on behalf of UNLV.
These calls had:
An average speed to answer of 34 seconds
An average talk time of 5:18
An abandon rate of 1.89%
UNLV IMPLEMENTS CXSELECT - A STUDENT-FOCUSED CONTACT CENTER SOLUTION
Shortening that window gave staff less time to handle financial aid disbursements, creating a surge of student questions. UNLV relied on CXSelect from ECSI to help answer those calls, emails, and chats, allowing staff to focus on other tasks. CXSelect fills service gaps and frees up UNLV staff to focus on core responsibilities. Representatives take incoming phone calls and guide students through general questions, program requirements, and deadlines. In some cases, ECSI staff can diagnose more elaborate problems, and reach out to UNLV to fix the issue, preventing students from making another call to correct the issue.
The relationship between ECSI and UNLV goes beyond a typical contact center. ECSI staff learned all the institution's ins and outs to help make sure they could handle a wide range of questions and support.
During UNLV’s peak call time, the week before student aid distribution, UNLV typically receives 700 to 800 calls daily, plus inquiries from students who contact them via chat or stop by the office in person. Goodwin says that volume isn’t sustainable for a staff of about 35 people.
“If we respond quickly to all of these students, that means every person in our office who interacts directly with students would need to see about 40 students a day,” he said. “Many of those calls and conversations might be five or 10 minutes. But some of those issues could take an hour or two to resolve.”
“They [ECSI staff] became part of our team. We even include them in our staff training,” Goodwin said. “It helps provide a smoother student experience to have ECSI staff embedded in our processes.”
STRENGTHENING RELATIONSHIPS AND CUSTOMER SERVICE
CXSelect helped answer those calls with warmth and institutional knowledge. For the fiscal year July 2023 - June 2024, excluding peak season, ECSI handled more than 52,000 calls out of UNLV’s total 60,757 queued calls.
In the cashier's office, Rose Cummings, UNLV’s Cashiering Supervisor, found her team needed the flexibility to focus on time-sensitive projects, instead of taking calls and answering similar questions repeatedly.
"I started with the team in 2004, and the phone would constantly ring off the hook," she added. "It would divide our attention between helping people in person and answering calls."
Working with ECSI to handle calls freed up staff, a big help in dealing with FAFSA delays. In that same July 2023 - June 2024 time frame, ECSI staff answered calls within 40 seconds and supported each caller for an average of about six minutes, saving UNLV staff a total of more than 6,057 hours on the phone. These metrics, including call volume, escalations, and high-level topics from each call are provided to UNLV in a comprehensive CXSelect dashboard report.
“Financial aid is a very emotional thing. You’re dealing with people’s goals, with their education, with their futures, with their money. These are very personal things that need to be handled with sensitivity and compassion,” he said. “Customer service is so important to weathering a time like this when there are so many unknowns. That kind of service is critical to keeping students engaged."
DIGGING INTO THE METRICS
Digging into those metrics can help UNLV staff figure out commonly asked questions, repeat issues, and other communication channels for its student body.
“It can help you identify trends,” Goodwin said. “It’s helpful to know how quickly calls are getting answered. I always joke that it makes me feel good when there is no trend, because this means we have just general, normal questions anyone might have.”
The strong collaboration between ECSI CXSelect’s team and UNLV not only makes it easier on UNLV’s staff, but also improves student relations. Goodwin wants to make sure the university continues putting students first and providing a positive experience.