Thirty seats across three roles, and the analyst you cannot skip

The seat mix reflects the channel split. The overlay reflects the fact that this runs at night — which changes what supervision costs and what it has to cover.

Billable seat mix
Role	Seats	Requirement	Billable
Chat-primary support agent	20	Strong written English, product-certified, comfortable at three concurrent chats	Yes
Email and escalation agent	7	Deeper product knowledge, writes long-form well, owns escalation quality	Yes
Technical specialist	3	Reproduces defects, reads logs, prepares engineering-ready escalations	Yes
Total productive seats	30	—	Billed at $1,000 each

Remember the multiplier. Thirty seats is approximately 147 people once the coverage arithmetic is applied. The seat mix above describes what is live at any moment, not the payroll.

Overlay

Management and support — your cost, already inside the rate

Two ratios here are set by the fact that this runs overnight rather than by the headcount.

Role	Count at 30 seats	Ratio standard	Purpose
Team leader	2	1 per 15, with night cover	Live floor supervision on every band, including overnight
Quality analyst	1	1 per 30	Contact audit, knowledge-base citation review, calibration
Trainer	1	1 per 50 during ramp	Induction, product certification, refresher on release changes
Delivery manager	1	1 per engagement	Service level, client review, escalation ownership
Workforce-management analyst	1	1 per engagement	Roster build, coverage evidence, shrinkage and bench planning
Compliance officer	0.5	Named, shared	Data protection, access control, incident handling

The workforce-management analyst is the role partners skip. On a business-hours process a team leader can keep the roster in a spreadsheet. On a 24/7 process with a 4.9 multiplier, the roster is a full-time analytical job, and the coverage credit lands on whoever decided it was not.

Rostering

Shift design, and why rotation speed matters

The roster must satisfy the minimum staffing for every band in every hour, which is a different constraint from covering an average day.

Fixed or slow-rotating patterns rather than fast rotation. People who cannot establish a sleep pattern resign, and resignations are what break coverage.
Team leadership present on every band including overnight, without exception.
Weekend and public-holiday cover planned as normal operating rather than as an exception — the client's customers do not observe Indian holidays, or their own.
A bench sized on actual attrition, reviewed monthly against the trailing three months.

The night shift is a real cost line. Transport, security, catering, statutory obligations for women on night shift, and a shift allowance that is not optional if you want people to stay. It is roughly twelve per cent of the cost base at thirty seats, and it does not scale away as you grow — which is why the margin curve flattens after thirty.

Hiring profile

Unbranded job descriptions accompany this proposal so that you can advertise on your own letterhead — they carry no client name and no Akontec name.

Attribute	Why it matters	How it is tested
Written English under time pressure	Every interaction is a written artefact the customer keeps and can screenshot.	Timed writing task in a live-chat simulator, no templates
Concurrency tolerance	Holding three threads with three contexts is a distinct cognitive skill.	Three simultaneous scripted conversations at assessment
Product comprehension	The mix is 35% how-to. An agent who does not understand the product guesses.	Product test after a fixed self-study window
Willingness to work nights sustainably	Not just willingness on day one — a pattern they can hold for a year.	Structured conversation about the actual roster, before offer

Certification

Stage	Content	Pass mark	Validity
Initial certification	Product, knowledge base, escalation matrix, tone guide, five assessed conversations	85%, no failed conversation	6 months
Release refresher	Any product change since the last sitting	85%	Rolls with the release
Re-certification	Full refresher plus two assessed conversations	85%	6 months

Next step

Hire the workforce-management analyst before the thirtieth agent.

On this process the roster is the deliverable, and the analyst is the person who owns it.

See the provider economics Read the onboarding plan