Call Centre Abuse

[Lakesailor]

Re: \"sheer greed\"

Buy everything from companies with UK call centres. It may not get the message across to the outsourcers, but it will mean that companies that create jobs in the UK propser.
Lakeland Ltd, kitchen gadget supremos employ all local staff. You can see the call centre staff through the glass when you're in the flagship head office store.

usual disclaimers.

 

[cliff]

Re: \"sheer greed\"

[ QUOTE ]
Or is this a good way of sharing out all our wealth across the world, and helping China and India become more developed ?

dv.

[/ QUOTE ]"Wealth"? - The U.K. is practically bankrupt - we are fast becoming a third world country ourselves.

IMHO It is time we started looking after our own interests first.
--------------------

"Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity"

 

[[2068]]

Re: \"sheer greed\"

Odd thing is, though, that it is the UK's willingness to consider these options that makes us "attractive" to foreign investment, hence more money flows in (comparing the UK to say, Germany, where the law is very protective of workers rights).

dv.

 

[webcraft]

Re: The problem is call centres, not their location . . .

I don't see the difference between speaking to someone who doesn't know me or my business and is in a big building in Manchester speaking in a mancunian accent and speaking to someone who doesn't know me or my business and is in a big building in Mumbai speaking in an Indian accent.

Essentially I think call centres are despicable dehumanising things - I thought this was what e-mail was developed for, to avoid time wasted on the phone talking to the wrong people.

However . . . I have to say that I always find Indians particularly polite, and therefore am slightly less likely to become abusive when they contact me. My 'favourite' are Irish call centres though . . . it has always been a relatively pleasant experience calling the Dell helpline.

Let's face it, if call centres were all based in the UK they would almost certainly be staffed by ethnic minorities in any event - Brits have by and large forgotten how to speak civilly or precisely.

- Nick

 

[tom52]

Hope you are still so philisophical when your job goes overseas.

 

[Lakesailor]

Re: The problem is call centres, not their location . . .

[ QUOTE ]
I don't see the difference between speaking to someone who doesn't know me or my business and is in a big building in Manchester speaking in a mancunian accent and speaking to someone who doesn't know me or my business and is in a big building in Mumbai speaking in an Indian accent.



[/ QUOTE ] The difference being that when talking to someone in the UK you are supporting a company that is paying salaries to support the UK economy.

When talking to someone who is in a call centre actually run by the company you are dealing with there is the possibility that your enquiry will be directed to someone who really understands the problem or query.

When I lived in East Yorkshire there was a business in Howden, I believe, that dealt in TV listings and soap synopsis for the cheap rags and also supplied daily info to foreign call centres so that the operators would sound like they knew all about Albert Square or Manchestr United.

Cynical, or what?

 

[beancounter]

It can get a bit silly... .

Our son worked for GE in Bristol for a while when he graduated. If he had an IT problem, he had to phone the GE support centre in Bangalore - who then phoned the UK support staff - who were on the floor below Chris, and would trot up to solve the problem....

 

[Aja]

It really shouldn't matter where the Call Centre is. The problem is that to make sufficient profits for shareholders, Companies - not just Banks have decided that the costs are so much lower when using Non-UK employees.

You will find that Call Centre operatives are employees of the UK Company they are representing.

The problem is that Customers - i.e. 'US' accept service equating to Call Centres rather than face-toface service from Branches.

Donald

 

[Gordonmc]

Nope. NM

n

 

[Nautorius]

Re: It can get a bit silly... .

Believe me, GE is far worse than that now...... /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

Paul

 

[tcm]

Re: Call employees of main company

really? I find that a bit unlikely.

If you phone Dell support frinstance (or most any PC puter support) you are actually calling a company like ICK sorbus which wins the contract to provide third party support. But not the actual company.

Being employee of a uk compnay give strange union-won rights like getting paid whilst er not doing any work

 

[Slow_boat]

Re: Call employees of main company

The only problem that I have with call centres abroad is that I sometimes have difficulty understanding the accent. Apart from that, and as long as one remembers that all call centres work to a script on a flow chart, I've always found them perfectly polite.

It may be worth noting that in India working in a call centre is a high status and very well paid job, unlike in the U K.
Some companies will only employ graduates fluent in at least two languages.

It can get a bit silly, though. I know for a fact that a U.K. police force did a feasability study of basing non emergency call centres in Ghana. I would imagine that the only thing that stopped them was the prospect of adverse public reaction. The only thing that Chief Constables are afraid of is Home Office disapproval or bad publicity.

 

[Sgeir]

[ QUOTE ]
You will find that Call Centre operatives are employees of the UK Company they are representing.

[/ QUOTE ]I think TCM's correct - many call centre functions, whether in the UK or India, have actually been outsourced to specialist companies. In places not far from you, like Greenock and Dunoon, companies like TSC for example will undertake customer contact or customer service work outsourced by bigger companies like utilities, insurance companies etc.

In turn some of the outsource companies have "offshored" to India. Even in the UK, work can be shifted around by the outsource firm. For example, I've heard that work outsourced by (I think) Westminster council may be diverted to Thurso or Wick. Bit tough for the present London based employees, some of whom I guess would have been TUPEd out of the council.

While the call centre staff in India are normally extremely well qualified, the Bain/Taylor Report found many of the problems that afflict the UK sector were also experienced there.

Some of the UK companies that have "offshored" are aware of a significant level of customer dissatisfaction. Some of the complaints can be seen to be racially motivated and these go into the bucket. But there are often genuine issues where misunderstandings have arisen simply because of lack of familiarity with things we might take for granted. For example, at home we have twice spent considerable sums of money on Dell computers which we think are extremely good. Our last puchase was marred a series of misunderstandings, particularly mispellings of email addresses that made things a bit tedious. Sorry Dell, we won't be back.

 

[Tisme]

I think that complaining about "exporting" jobs, or expecting to see companies employing locally, totally ignores the fact that we are in a global market and companies can, and should, go to the best place to source the goods and services they require.

Personally I don't care where a call centre is. Neither do I care about the nationality, colour, religion or even the sexual orientation of call centre staff. HOWEVER, what really infuriates me is when I find I am talking to somebody whose pronounciation and comprehension of English is just not good enough for them to do the job. Many times I have ended up talking to an Indian call centre and it has been virtually impossible to sort out the query because of the language barrier. Usually they want to stay on their script, but if what I want to talk about is not scripted they are simply unable to help.

Two days ago I took a call at work. I simply couldn't understand what they were saying to me. After asking them to repeat themselves several times I had to tell them that there was no point carrying on the "conversation" and I hung up. I will never know if they understood why I finished the call!

 

[brianrunyard]

I don't care where the call centre is, provided they can understand me, I can understand them and I get good service.

 

[bob_tyler]

"provided they can understand me"

Only last week I called British Gas. My call was taken in broad Glaswegian and despite 18 months National Service many years ago in Maryhill Barracks I could only understand about one word in four. In the end I had to call back again and luckily the accent wasn't so strong. Even then the appointment went wrong! Probably a mis-interpretation into English on my part.