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The differences between customer agents and customer service representatives can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 6-12 months to become both a customer agent and a customer service representative. Additionally, a customer service representative has an average salary of $32,260, which is higher than the $31,834 average annual salary of a customer agent.
The top three skills for a customer agent include data entry, customer service and outbound calls. The most important skills for a customer service representative are cleanliness, POS, and data entry.
| Customer Agent | Customer Service Representative | |
| Yearly salary | $31,834 | $32,260 |
| Hourly rate | $15.30 | $15.51 |
| Growth rate | -4% | -4% |
| Number of jobs | 211,832 | 209,515 |
| Job satisfaction | - | 4 |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 42% | High School Diploma, 33% |
| Average age | 40 | 40 |
| Years of experience | 12 | 12 |
A customer agent provides friendly service to external and internal customers. Customer agents talk to customers on behalf of businesses and companies. They help customers with their queries and complaints. It is their job to give customers a better understanding of the products. They answer questions with regards to their reservations. Sometimes, they also have sales roles. Oftentimes, they answer questions, process sales, provide information, and resolve problems.
Customer service representatives are the first point of contact of the customers, acting as the frontiers of the company and help in driving customer loyalty and retention by leaving a great impression and resolving all of their concerns. They accommodate customer queries by providing useful and comprehensive information about any products or services. Some would use that as an opportunity to market and promote more sales. The most challenging issues they use to handle are customer complaints and processing of refunds and returns. They also assist in basic troubleshooting or accounts and payment setup with the use of specific guidelines or step by step procedures. At most, they help and solve customer issues on their own, but sometimes they would need support from supervisors or other departments.
Customer agents and customer service representatives have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Customer Agent | Customer Service Representative | |
| Average salary | $31,834 | $32,260 |
| Salary range | Between $25,000 And $39,000 | Between $25,000 And $41,000 |
| Highest paying City | New York, NY | Des Moines, WA |
| Highest paying state | New York | Washington |
| Best paying company | Speedway Motors | Oracle |
| Best paying industry | Technology | Insurance |
There are a few differences between a customer agent and a customer service representative in terms of educational background:
| Customer Agent | Customer Service Representative | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 42% | High School Diploma, 33% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | - | - |
Here are the differences between customer agents' and customer service representatives' demographics:
| Customer Agent | Customer Service Representative | |
| Average age | 40 | 40 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 43.8% Female, 56.2% | Male, 30.5% Female, 69.5% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 11.9% Unknown, 5.5% Hispanic or Latino, 19.3% Asian, 7.0% White, 55.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7% | Black or African American, 11.6% Unknown, 5.2% Hispanic or Latino, 21.2% Asian, 6.3% White, 55.0% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7% |
| LGBT Percentage | 7% | 7% |