Customer Service Professional Salary
Determining the salaries of customer service professionals can take a little work because of the nature of the profession. There are many different jobs that can be described as customer service professionals.
A good base profession is that of customer service representative. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics – a federal agency that tracks salaries and career information in the United States – found that there were about 2.2 million people employed as customer service representatives in 2009. The Bureau did a pretty good job of tracking their salary information and breaking it down.
Salaries for Customer Service Representatives in the United States
The average annual or yearly wage for a customer service representative in the United States in 2009 was $32,410. The average salary for such a representative was $15.58.
This salary was some what lower than average wages for comparable professions in the US. The reason the wage is low is that most customer service representative jobs require no special training or education.
Salaries in some segments of customer service were even lower. The average wage for business support specialists was $12.55 an hour in 2009. Even those in agencies in brokerages didn’t earn that high a wage their average salary was about $16.77 an hour.
There were industries where customer service reps did take home a pretty good pay. These included:
- Natural gas pipeline companies where the average salary was $53,870 a year.
- Water transportation (ocean and barge shipping) where the average salary was $47,320 a year.
- Aerospace where the average salary was $46,930 a year.
- Satellite communications where the average salary was $45,850 a year.
These statistics do suggest that it is possible for individuals to find well paid positions in customer service. Individuals will have to search for them and get experience in other areas before seeking such positions.
Sales Positions & Insurance
Many individuals in customer service can earn very good salaries by going into sales positions. Some of these jobs can be quite lucrative but individuals in them will be dependent upon commissions for the majority of their income.
The average salary for insurance agents in the United States was $61,330 a year in 2009. Persons entering this field will have to get a license. In addition to selling insurance policies such agents provide a wide variety of customer service. Something to consider is that many new opportunities in this field could open up as federal laws mandating that individuals buy health insurance go into effect in 2014.
Top earners in the insurance industry were quite well compensated they made around $114,000 a year or more. Individuals that open their own insurance agencies can also make very good salaries.
Something to consider is that entry level insurance agents often make a very low salary until they learn the business. It often takes years to build up a lucrative insurance agency or sales.
Customer service representatives in the insurance industry only made around $16 an hour in 2009. Claims adjustors and other professionals working at insurance companies were also quite well compensated.
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