Another Example of Failing Foreign Call Centres......

[BrumBilly]

I didn't mean to cause offense and I did try to qualify my statement by saying I had 'limited experience'.

I wasn't tarring everyone with the same brush. I'm simply stating that when I've had to contact call centres I've all too often found myself in the hands of rude, unhelpful and not too bright individuals and that given the choice I'd take an incompetent 'foreigner' over an incompetent 'Brit' as to date the 'foreigners' have NEVER talked down to me or been down right rude!

Like I've said before, customer service is a skilled job and takes motivated people of high ability to be done well which is why the dole queue isn't the first place I'd be looking to fill any gaps. If I was on the dole I'd be wanting to get a job that suits my skills rather than be pushed into a job that many think 'anyone' can do when this clearly isn't the case.

[GlasgowBandit]

I didn't mean to cause offense and I did try to qualify my statement by saying I had 'limited experience'.

I wasn't tarring everyone with the same brush. I'm simply stating that when I've had to contact call centres I've all too often found myself in the hands of rude, unhelpful and not too bright individuals and that given the choice I'd take an incompetent 'foreigner' over an incompetent 'Brit' as to date the 'foreigners' have NEVER talked down to me or been down right rude!

Like I've said before, customer service is a skilled job and takes motivated people of high ability to be done well which is why the dole queue isn't the first place I'd be looking to fill any gaps. If I was on the dole I'd be wanting to get a job that suits my skills rather than be pushed into a job that many think 'anyone' can do when this clearly isn't the case.

Its cool mate you don't have to explain yourself in truth I probably agree with you I just had a bad day where I had to deal with a few complaints from folk who had similar sentiments when I managed to listen to the calls it turned out to be a nonsense and 3 punters telling blatant lies, one of the ones i dealt with even had some very choice and colourful words about "you jocks" 

[Newmanseye]

Like I've said before, customer service is a skilled job and takes motivated people of high ability to be done well which is why the dole queue isn't the first place I'd be looking to fill any gaps. If I was on the dole I'd be wanting to get a job that suits my skills rather than be pushed into a job that many think 'anyone' can do when this clearly isn't the case.

Whilst I see your point about forcing people in to jobs they don't want to do, some people are looking for jobs that simply are not there anymore, hence the retraining, not all call centers are customer service based roles, some are investigatory, some are sales and so on.  Whilst I do not condone imposing a job on the workless i do condone the improvement of skill sets and the expansion of available choices, hence the reason for the retraining.

[BrumBilly]

Whilst I see your point about forcing people in to jobs they don't want to do, some people are looking for jobs that simply are not there anymore, hence the retraining, not all call centers are customer service based roles, some are investigatory, some are sales and so on.  Whilst I do not condone imposing a job on the workless i do condone the improvement of skill sets and the expansion of available choices, hence the reason for the retraining.

Good points well made!

Its cool mate you don't have to explain yourself in truth I probably agree with you I just had a bad day where I had to deal with a few complaints from folk who had similar sentiments when I managed to listen to the calls it turned out to be a nonsense and 3 punters telling blatant lies, one of the ones i dealt with even had some very choice and colourful words about "you jocks" 

Cheers! BTW there's nowt wrong with 'you jocks' (foreigners...lol) seeing as my mother's from Ayr! 

[Royal Flush]

we have people in this country currently on the unemployment line that can be retrained to successfully fill these positions.

Anyone who is physically fit can get a job in this country.

As for the call centre, at least if its in this country it will be a quicker call as i don't have to repeat myself 14 times because he cant understand my accent.

[Newmanseye]

we have people in this country currently on the unemployment line that can be retrained to successfully fill these positions.

Anyone who is physically fit can get a job in this country.

As for the call centre, at least if its in this country it will be a quicker call as i don't have to repeat myself 14 times because he cant understand my accent.

Eh???

[boldie]

ah yes...,the basic misunderstanding about call centres. To be honest I love reading these posts.
I have been in management in call centres for years (before I moved into consultancy) and for some rason some people fail to see the actual problem with them.

Call centres are regarded as cost-only to most businesses. This especially goes for the Customer Service part of a call-centre.
That's why you see most companies moving towards outsourcing their customer service to "specialist" companies (like the ones in India, RHL in Glasgow and that dump in Motherwell.)

This means that all the mother companies actually do is look at the cost from then on. they have very little to no involvement in the Customer service part of their business anymore.
The outsourcing companies don't actually care all that much about the customers as it is not "their" business (after all, they don't lose money due to poor customer service).
Outsourcing companies are hardly ever represented in meetings from their clients to discuss improvement to Customer Service. This means that a company that doesn't deal with customer service now decides on how someone else should deal with it, when they themselves have very little idea about what the issues are.

Real customer Service people, who are good at their job are always hard to find. They ussually get pretty poor pay (outsourcing companies pay rubbish) and if you want professionals you have to pay for it. It takes a very special sort of person (some would say sick in the head) to listen to 200 complaints a day and not get ticked off. Paying 5.50 an hour doesn't get you those people (in my team in IBM, in part thanks to out of hours bonusses, my agents made more then the team leaders of other teams...I only hired the best from within IBM) and Lord knows outsourcing companies only care about their cost/profit margin.


Customer don't vote with their feet, no matter what you might believe. How long have you had you account with the same bank even though they are a pain in the arse? Have you actually switched your insurance policy? And the companies everyone complains about (BT, SKY, NTL, Scottish gas/power etc.) essentially have a monopoly on the market...you can't go to anyone else but SKY or NTL for your television packages, so what do they care?

In IT (I used to work for IBM) a lot of focus was placed on Customer Service when Lou Gerstner took over. IBM doesn't give a crap that you buy it's computers..it cares about you buying their Service Agreements. (especially companies). Sure they might be a bit more expensive BUT ring IBM and see what happens? Calls answered with 10-20 seconds, engineer out ASAP. Real problems fixed within 4-8 hours. That's customer service. And that's also why IBM is the nr1 for business support these days (they were just about stone last before Gerstner decided to change it)

In Banking and insurance in Holland (when I did consultancy for an insurance firm) again, Calls answered with 20 seconds problems dealt with ASAP. The reason the banks there have to be that customer focussed is because we actually have competition between banks. You don't have that here, everything is agreed between them. Most banks are merging with eachother or have other economic ties that are unhealthy for customers. And as long as everyone in the industry does it the customers can't do anything about it (actually they will just accept it as "the way it goes")

The problem isn't that a call center is in India, the problem is that the Customer Service is outsourced, this creates a gap between the company you buy a product from and yourself.
Bringing call centers back to the UK sounds like a great idea but it's not the solution to your problems (even though the daily mail tells you it is). If you were to only deal with companies who do in-house customer service you'll ussually be much better off.

There is no doubt that the people in India are, overall, MUCH more caring about their customers then the ones in the UK. They are also MUCH better educated (people with PHD's actually answer the phone), sure they might have the occasional problem with your accent if it's very strong...but so would someone from the other side of the UK. the reason for them being, potentially, better then agents in the UK is because the pay (relatively to the UK) attracts a better quality of staff. (like I said 5.50-6.50 an hour doesn't get you the best in any business on any level)

If companies were to keep a closer eye on their customer service (or keep it in-house but the dept. in India)a nd train the staff themselves I just about guarantee you call centres in India would be celebrated by everyone who doesn't read the daily mail and thinks the foreigners are stealing the jobs..



end rant.

[AdamM]

as usual 

[patman]

greta post  - cuts to the thrust

the company is to blame not the call centre...they hire them , they pay them, they could if they wanted challenge the service levels or god forbid take the service back in house....but hell that would mean being accountable and we cant have that..

i bank with rbs..or natwest...they are poor basically are a selling service and are much of a muchness ...i stay with them. why?

1. i have it on file that they do not call me ..ever...they do not write to me ...ever.
2. if they break that its 50 quid a time in my hip pocket for them doing it....i`m 150 quid up at the moment
3. they have a branch...no privacy i hear you cry...true but when i go in i ask for a room every time and get it...privacy. So if i have a problem i dont end up speaking to a call centre i walk in and get a person...or i can phone the branch and get a numpty...

i keep it nice and personal and if they ever decided to go the call centre route i`d be off....call centres are the waiting room of life ...why bother

[byronkincaid]

if they break that its 50 quid a time in my hip pocket for them doing it....i`m 150 quid up at the moment

how did you get that agreement?

[patman]

Byron,
 I had been getting pain in the arse marketing from rbs and had a fair bit of time wasted with "account reviews" and nusiance calls disguised as customer care
It has been ongoing for about year and a half. basically the last straw was RBS use a letter which they send . The letter gives it "can you contact us as a matter of urgency we have been trying to contact you" ...which is a scare letter. You phone them up to find out it is a marketing tool to get you to go in for a review...which is trying to sell to you. They had not contacted or attempted to contact me at all...they had e mail, mobile, work and home tel numbers to do so.

I went Tonto on them at the time and accused them of invading my privacy and marketing in such a way that it could cause alarm to the elderly etc in receiving such a letter.
 I stated that i wanted it on file in my account notes that i was never to be contacted and that any such instance would result in a formal complaint for which i would expect recompense for time wasted and invasion of privacy.

they have broken this 3 times, 3 times i have penned an epistle already prewritten and 3 times i have had the said cash.

i havent had a call in a while...

[roverthtaeh]

BT just this minute telephoned me to try and sell me a Broadband package (I think).
The gentleman on the other end of the line was clearly Indian.
I AM interested in changing over as it happens (The Hoff's company is bloody useless), but in all honestly I couldn't understand a word the gentleman was saying.
Bottom line, language breakdown, no resolution.