Answer rate
Answer rate is useful and dangerous in the same way: it moves easily, including for the wrong reasons.
Why it matters
It is the headline number most teams report, and on its own it rewards exactly the behaviour that makes an assistant untrustworthy — because the fastest way to raise it is to stop refusing.
- Answer rate reported without refusal volume beside it
- Rising automation metrics alongside falling satisfaction
- Targets set on a number that improves when quality drops
What it measures
The proportion of conversations the assistant answered rather than declined. It says nothing about whether those answers were correct, which is the limitation that matters.
What to read it beside
Refusal volume and satisfaction. Rising answers with falling refusals means coverage genuinely improved; rising answers with flat refusals and falling satisfaction means it started attempting things it should decline.
With refusals
Distinguishes better coverage from looser grounding.
With CSAT
Distinguishes resolution from customers giving up.
Common questions
- What is a good answer rate?
- There is no meaningful universal figure, because it depends on how completely your content covers your domain. Whether it is improving while satisfaction holds is the question worth asking.
- Is answer rate the same as deflection rate?
- No, and conflating them overstates results. Answer rate counts conversations the bot ended; deflection counts tickets that did not happen. Many bot conversations would never have been tickets.
From the blog
All posts- MeasuringResolution rate vs deflection: stop mixing the twoResolution and deflection answer different questions. Mixing them inflates the result and hides whether customers actually got what they needed.Read
- EvaluatingWhen “I don’t know” is the correct product behaviourAssistants that always answer look helpful in demos and dangerous in production. When refusal is the right behaviour — and how to evaluate it.Read
- MeasuringWhat a refusal list is for (and how to rank it)What a refusal list is for: turning honest “I don’t know” moments into a ranked content backlog that drives support automation forward.Read
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