Preply scales team by 7x while achieving 60% AHT improvement

Preply is a leading online language learning platform that connects millions of students worldwide with qualified tutors for personalized lessons. Bassel El-Ebiary, Workforce Management Analyst at Preply, has witnessed the company's transformation firsthand during his four-plus years there. When he first joined, the customer support team was around 30 people. Today, it's nearly 200 across customer care, operations, training, quality assurance, and workforce management functions.

When spreadsheets hit their breaking point

Previously, the company was managing workforce operations with basic tools that couldn't scale. The team relied on Humanity for simple scheduling uploads and extensive Google Sheets workflows for forecasting and staffing management. Every day, Bassel personally created daily schedule reports in Google Sheets for agents to see their shifts, breaks, and meetings.

The breaking point came when Preply crossed the 100 customer care agent threshold. Their existing tool contract was ending, creating pressure to find a solution.

The monthly scheduling process that once took three days was stretching to a full week for one person.

Finding the perfect fit and onboarding in one month

With just two people on the workforce management team, the decision to upgrade became critical. They evaluated three to four options, including Surfboard, but Assembled stood out.

Schedule generation topped their must-have list as the biggest pain point. They also needed maximum automation, real-time monitoring they'd never had before, and seamless integrations with Intercom, Slack, Google Calendar, and Klaus (their QA platform).

Despite complex requirements, including data cleanup issues and setting up an extensive list of time-off categories and custom event types, implementation was seamless and speedy, surpassing their target launch date and completing the transition in just one month.

"Sweet relief" and measurable results

The moment the Preply team could turn off their manual processes, Bassel describes feeling "sweet relief." The results were immediate and measurable.

Using Assembled’s schedule generation, the team has configured dozens of rules to automatically create optimal schedules in seconds — schedules that always follow business rules and regional labor laws without manual compliance checks. The ability to set breaks at hourly and 30-minute intervals provides granular precision that was impossible before.

Since they started using Assembled, schedule adherence has improved by 5.8%, average handle time has dropped by 60%, and CSAT scores have remained consistently strong despite rapid scaling. The Agent Scorecard now allows agents to see their adherence scores and detailed shift breakdowns, contributing to steady adherence improvements.

Another unexpected benefit was improved workforce literacy across the organization. Assembled's intuitive interface allowed them to give access to all managers, trainers, and operations staff.

The team successfully transitioned from a single operational level to three different tiers for their customer care team — something that would have been impossible with manual processes.

Time returned, focus elevated

The transformation fundamentally changed how Bassel spends his time. Instead of manual scheduling consuming entire weeks, he focuses on strategic improvements and process optimization.

His role now involves analyzing processes for improvement opportunities, determining how to better utilize Assembled's features, and integrating the platform deeper into workflows.

From a two-person workforce management team managing 200+ people across multiple time zones, Preply has built a scalable, data-driven operation that can grow with its ambitions while maintaining the flexibility and international collaboration that make its platform successful.