Nice RAC man's just disappeared!

[raven]

Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

Really miffed to learn this evening that 1700 jobs have gone skew-whiff because The RAC has been bought by Norwich Union. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

Seems that NU will shed 900 jobs through "Administrative Efficiency" and 800 jobs by relocating "Customer Enquiry Calls" to a call centre in India.

Last year NU shed 1900 UK jobs within their own organisation by switching call centres to India.

Trouble is, that's 2700 UK people that aint paying no tax, that require help from other (already overburdened) UK taxpayers, and who will not be able to avail themselves of NU investment or insurance policies or RAC breakdown cover on cars that they can no longer afford.

I dont have any dealings with NU or RAC but if I did I would be considering some form of admin. efficiencies and outsourcing the business to other (more ethical) organisations!

Rant over.......oooooh that feels better!

 

[[2068]]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

I can't help thinking along similar lines, which are that looking at the bigger picture, companies that offshore employees are also offshoring the consumers that were previously their employees. At some point, health and safety implications, benefits, and rising wages will produce more a level playing field: trouble is, this could take 30 years, by which time we will have lost some fundamental skills forever.

dv.

 

[Planty]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

Quote: "by which time we will have lost some fundamental skills forever."

but hopefully not the ability to understand what the hell it is the person on the other end of the line in the Call Centre is actually saying !! Or is it just me or has that been lost already?? eg CitiBank!!

 

[BrendanS]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

Yes, but just try finding another major financial institute that's not doing the same thing

 

[halcyon]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

The problem is that it's now the engineering component industry thats moving to India. Try finding something not made in China these days. Bit like a balloon, you keep blowing and it keeps getting bigger, then all at once bang, and what have you ?????????????????????.
Have you tried putting a balloon back together ???.


Brian

 

[tcm]

um, but think through it though ...

Yep, i agree it wiould be nice to keep the jobs. But unfortunately or otherwsie, that ain't how it works. If more efficiently managed and hence potentially cheaper insurance, services and stuff aren't produced when they can be then someone else will do it, so instead of just losing 1700 jobs, the uk loses the lot. Dyson had a bad press for moving manufactuing abroad - but now actually employs more uk admin than manufacturing+admin he did before the move. The message of the eighties was that nobody has a "right" to a job, and that miners couldn't go on strike with the passionate yet misguided idea that they could pass "their" job down the generations. It's not "ethical" to have overmanning - in the long run it costs more jobs cos the whole business loses to others from overseas.
If the job is done, or not needed -that's that. You don't keep paying a plumber and hourly rate when the plumbing works, and i don't employ a coalman to deliver sacks of coal just to keep his wife and kids. Nor do i stay in a taxi to run up a few more quid at christmas, or jump in and out of a few taxis to keep more of them in work.
Partly through crap management, partly through overpowerful unions, partly through thin-thinking politicians from the govt to the man in the street, the uk has lost lots of industries that it could have kept - if it had metaphorically stopped the cab and instead of trying to keep all the jobs it concentrated on making the business leaner, albeit meaner. Lots of unemployment benefits, lots of govt jobs all push up the costs of running a business in the uk, and many of the grants and subsidises encourage people to do things that in reality are no longer needed. Work hard, get rich or die young. It's the way of the world. Sad but true!

 

[Talbot]

Re: um, but think through it though ...

A cold blast of reality, such a pity that so many people (including politicians and most union leaders seem unable to grasp this fundamental law of world commerce.

 

[Dave_Snelson]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

I won't join in this debate, coz raven knows what I do (or did) for a living!! /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

 

[KevB]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

Does anyone know of a list on the web that shows which companies only use "off shore" call centres? I would make a point of not using them.

The funniest thing you get now is the telephone cold callers who have distinct foreign accents and introduce themselves as Joanne or David or one of many other Britsh sounding names.

 

[Dave_Snelson]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

No such list exists - and if it did, it would be out of date. My own personal knowledge (which I won't divulge) is a list of all the usual suspects but there are surprises in there as well. One of the biggest surprises being one that is pulling back from off-shoring due "customer service issues".

Interestingly, the Indian companies that we Brits outsource to, are in turn looking at outsourcing the outsource to China, coz its cheaper for them. And so it goes in the global economy. Don't forget, a lot of what you see and read is fashionable business fads that will fade as the emporer appears sans his new clothes...

Now - woh yoo won anyway Mr KenB /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[ashanta]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

What peeves me about it they bought the RAC with half of their profits from last years trading!
I have lost significantly with Norwich on mortgage endownment just because it was taken out before 1988 and the creation of the FSO!

There will be no terminal bonus and I am having to find the shortfall by creating other investments.

Peter.

 

[cliff]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

[ QUOTE ]
Quote: "by which time we will have lost some fundamental skills forever."

but hopefully not the ability to understand what the hell it is the person on the other end of the line in the Call Centre is actually saying !! Or is it just me or has that been lost already?? eg CitiBank!!

[/ QUOTE ]We already have lost "fundamental" skills such as brickies, joiners, plumbers, tailors, nuclear engineers /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif,Doctors, dentists, nurses etc, etc.......
I for one will be cancelling my insurance with NU on next renewal date as I am fed up talking to indian call center personnel who cannot understand simple english. That, and their £25 cashback offers that never arrive until one has made half a dozen or more phone calls.
Unfortunately, "Joe public" in the UK is so laidback and dare one say selfish thet he (she) will moan a bit but continue to pay up and do business with such companies. If everyone with NU policies gave NU notice of cancellation of said policies they (NU) would soon change their policies - pardon the pun. Same applies to the TV licence - what if everyone refused to renew it - what are the govt. going to do? arrest everyone? fine everyone? no, they would have to drop the TV licence but British "Joe Public" is so brain washed and selfish they will payup. Same applies to road tax, Council tax / rates but it takes a united front which we will never have in the U.K. as every Govt is well aware. The fuel price demonstrations were a good example but can you imagine what would happen if EVERYONE stayed at home and there was a general strike until TB liar brought down fuel tax?
But of course TB liar knows that will never happen as there will always be the selfish few who can pay the tax and will pay and the general strike would collapse.
Come the revolution..........
----------

 

[Cobra]

Next Question...

[ QUOTE ]

Interestingly, the Indian companies that we Brits outsource to, are in turn looking at outsourcing the outsource to China, coz its cheaper for them. And so it goes in the global economy.

[/ QUOTE ]

...how much longer will it be before the Chinese start outsourcing the already outsourced outsource back to the UK to boost THEIR profits???

 

[Dave_Snelson]

Re: Next Question...

Nope - its Maldives and Phlippines next...

 

[moodycruiser]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

In my mind the companies that move their call centres abroad are not doing it to give us a cheaper product/service but purely to increase their own profit margins, thus I reckon that any company that outsources call centres abroad should pay a penalty tax to help offset the extra drain on the taxpayers resources for those that have been unfairly put out of work.
(This tax should be high enough to deter them in the first place)
I'm fed being routed half way round the world when dealing with equipment manufacturers tech. help lines, listening to some cra**y music for 30 minutes after having gone through six or seven layers of exchange menu options only to find I can't understand a bl**dy word of what they're saying and by the time I've worked it out I've almost forgotten what the symptoms were anyway.
Above a certain age it is increasingly difficult or nigh impossible to find new comparable employment.
All in the name of better service ???? Who for ?..... /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[BrendanS]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

I see Mars the chocolate people have just announced they are going to lose 700 jobs by moving some of their manufacturing off shore, so it's not just service industries

 

[Cobra]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

[ QUOTE ]
I see Mars the chocolate people have just announced they are going to lose 700 jobs by moving some of their manufacturing off shore, so it's not just service industries

[/ QUOTE ]

Friends Provident carry out their basic Life Assurance medical underwriting in India!

 

[raven]

Re: um, but think through it though ...

TCM makes several very good points, about the way in which global businesses work. However there is a fundamental issue that seems to be missed by the big corporations and that is "Customer Service."

How many of the posts above refer to the poor service / language skills of the overseas call centres. The result of outsourcing abroad seems to be that we (the consumer) get a poorer service at no less cost than when the function was fulfilled in good old blighty. The cost savings are invariably trousered by the shareholders.

In the old days if we got poor service from the plumber / mechanic / corner shop or whatever we could and would vote with our feet - nowadays we seem to put up with it because we are just some small cog in the global mechanism.

I wonder how many people would have to take the same action as Cliff before Norwich Union could be persuaded to adopt a more ethical policy.

Mr Snelson sir, I read your earlier posting and if I were to be very cruel and unkind (and purely in the context of the above) I would have to say a clear case of the biter bit! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Maybe it's about time you became a real welder! And if you want someone to carry your bag for you - you've got my number!

 

[Dave_Snelson]

Re: um, but think through it though ...

Ah, but the biter wasn't bit, he volunteered!!

Maybe we'll all be welders one day /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Tomorrow at 13:00 is the deadline time and all will be revealed then. Every man has his price!

 

[xr3i]

Re: Nice RAC man\'s just disappeared!

Us Nice RAC men do still exist,its just that Norwich Union part of the Aviva group have bought us just like LEX did a few years ago.