Give me a break! The overseas call centers aren't that bad.

[Crazy Dave]

Seems to be America's new and favorite punching bag, the people who work in foreign call centers. I've only had one incident where the language was a problem but through patience and politeness on both ends we got through it okay. The guy's english was sure better than my hindi and I complimented him for putting the effort into learning our language and it sure eased his noticeable embarrassment.

Really now, what do people expect from these poor folks? They download free games and screensavers loaded with spyware, go onto file trading sites loaded with viruses and trojans, then their machine breaks down and they get pissed because the guy on the other end of the phone can't instantly fix it right then, right now and so they blame it on the person's accent.

[Gormy Cuss]

1. Rut roh

:popcorn:

[SteppingRazor]

2. None of that's the issue...

the loss of American jobs is.

For the record, I've actually yet to deal with a foreign call center :shrug:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

3. Just a couple of points of rebuttal.

1) They're being paid to put effort into speaking our language. It's not exactly an altruistic venture that should be praised. No one praises you for just doing the basics required to do your job.

2) Frustration is less with the centers themselves than it is with companies unwilling to pay Americans to do the same job, coupled with the fact that while they're firing Americans, their making their customer service that much more frustrating.

3) I do agree people shouldn't take it out on the call center reps themselves. This does nothing positive.

[Crazy Dave]

7. I disagree though with the type of statements you hear like:

"They're taking away "american" jobs. No employee over there has taken away anything from somebody over here. Now the company's shareholders might be a different story but the typical statement is highly inaccurate. Plus the fact that I've never had somebody overseas be rude to me like most Americans in customer service here seem to be.
The term "rude and arrogant Americans" wasn't just made up, it was earned.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

11. I did NOT say that.

I said COMPANIES and was very specific in doing so.

[Crazy Dave]

14. I know what you meant

I was adding to your statement not criticizing it. I did re-type my reply title to hopefully clarify that.:hi:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

4. I agree.

It seems like the people upset because they guy they talk to on the phone has an accent, are the same sort of people screaming about how everybody needs to learn English.

[Crazy Dave]

8. Good point

:thumbsup: :hi:

Edit - Also the same people who only want to post on message boards with a foreign made PC they paid $500 for versus one made in America, if there are any that would probably cost about $2000.
I used to build my own but now I have a laptop.

[1monster]

30. Which computers are made in the USA? I didn't know anything was

made here anymore.

[Mutley]

5. I've no problems with the people who work at the call centers.

They're just trying to make a living like the rest of us. I do have a problem with the loss of American jobs and the frustration of two people who can barely understand each other trying to communicate about complicated things .

[u4ic]

17. I think the latter is an important point

I've hardly had to deal with any overseas call centres, but I find I can barely understand someone who speaks without an accent when they're talking fast; nevermind someone who does, in one I may not be very familiar with. (and I'm someone who loves to hear different voices and accents)

The people I've known who've worked in them have all said they have quotas, and the calls have to be as brief as possible. I think it must be frustrating for them, too.

[Mutley]

21. Oh I know it's frustrating for them.

I called to one of the call centers in India once, and the operator actually thanked me for being nice about the difficulty communicating. That goes to show how many people act like assholes.

[Crazy Dave]

28. Frustrating indeed

Then you got some idiot whose new computer just crashed because he was on a bunch of raunchy porn sites and got loaded up with spyware and trojans yelling at him/her saying that the computer he just bought is defective.

[Deja Q]

24. Yeah, but what if your job was taken and given to them?

How would you react?

It's great to help others.

But not at the expense of others.

[Mutley]

25. I couldn't have a problem with that One individual who had my job.

It wasn't his/her decision to take my job. That person just wants to feed his/her family like any of us. I'd blame the ones who made the decision.

[Deja Q]

27. That's how I'd feel. Still, what can you do either way?

So many laws you can't start your own small business; the laws are made for the benefit of the big ones - the only ones who can afford the lawyers necessary to wade through the crap.

[Scout1071]

29. I agree completely.

I have no problem with the people themselves, but I do get pissed about the loss of American jobs and the communication issues. And I get furious when the call drops and there is no way to find the same person who was helping you.

[Ravenseye]

6. I've had numerous bad experiences

Just a few nights ago 3 different guys named "John" calling "right from New York City" called between 7:30 and 9:30 to sell us Dish Network. We kept saying to take us off the list but they didn't seem to understand. Not their fault, but they couldn't seem to break from their 'script' and taking us off their call list wasn't on it.

That's nothing though...

One of those lovely overseas call center guys cost me $1000.00 by not filing a claim of mine correctly with a credit card company (filed it as $10.00 not $1000.00) and even though everything he said on the phone was correct we found out about the error too late and are out $990.00 for nothing.

I've called numerous times and tried to deal with people I could barely communicate with and I've had enough. I'll either ask to speak with their manager or dig up a number in America. Many places have a few people in places in the U.S. and I just call back until I get one of these people. The last time I did that, the two indian people were throughly convinced that I couldn't do it, so I called back a few times till I got an American and she immediately said "no problem" and did it for me.

I'm not saying that you can't have decent service from overseas, that's happened to me as well, but I've had plenty of bad experiences that I've never had with American (or Canadian) customer service. I'm never rude to them, they're just doing a job. I just dont' think they're trained to do their jobs well enough by the companies exploiting them.

[BlueCollar]

9. You obviously aren't a TXU customer

Their call center in India is staffed by the most awful representatives...totally incompetent.

[Frank Cannon]

10. The language barrier isn't the half of it

These people are trained to say ONLY what they're told to say. They read off a standard menu and if your problem doesn't match their limited parameters, you're simply SOL. Forget about talking to anyone who actually has the connections/equipment/brains/authority to actually do anything.

90% of call-center problems are actually of the "did you turn it on?" variety. Companies that employ overseas call centers bank on the 90% probability that YOUR problem will be like that, which sucks for the other 10% of us.

I've had many, many experiences with overseas call centers. ALL BAD. And that has nothing to do with the language. Most of the people I talked to spoke English quite well.

[Crazy Dave]

13. They read off "scripts" here too

It's quite noticeable when the person doesn't speak with an accent. That and people overseas say "sir" instead of "dude". It has happened.
Most call centers are contracted anyways so if you call Bellsouth or HP chances are that person doesn't even work for that company and some call centers even hire out to different companies in totally different industries at the same time. One call will be from a person with a bad toaster oven, then the next call will be from someone who can't get their antivirus program to install or start up.

[acmavm]

12. I tried to order a printer cartridge from Dell once. I had to hang

up. Have no idea what the person on the other line was saying.

[Aristus]

15. Almost all of my experiences with call centers in India have been good

ones. I usually get helpful service from people who are extremely friendly. One time I had to get some service regarding my department store card, and a nice Hindi lady helped me; she spoke beautiful English, and her accent was so sultry and sexy I could have talked to her all day. :loveya: I even told her "You have a lovely accent" before finishing my call.

[Orsino]

16. I don't blame the phone reps.

I blame the vicious companies who have ESL students answering phone calls from Americans. They realize that they are just making customer service that much harder to obtain, but the alleged savings outweigh our inconvenience.

[Deja Q]

26. Corporations LOATHE customer service, as a business.

That's why they don't want to pay for it.

Everything for nothing. By the nothing.

[LeftyMom]

18. Yeah, they are

I have a hearing problem. It really sucks to have to strain to hear somebody, concentrate to understand them, put up with thier attitude when I ask them to repeat themselves and when I finally decode what the hell they're saying realize that they're just some numbskull who knows about as much about the product as I do reading some troubleshooting chart to me. Here's an idea, put the chart on the website so I can spare you the labor cost and me the aggravation for the minor stuff. Then if that doesn't work, if I call I expect to hear somebody who speaks intelligible English and won't tell me to power cycle my modem three times before they try something else (SBC "customer service," this means you.)

[Crazy Dave]

19. What did you say?

Jes' kidding ;)

[LeftyMom]

20. I'm sorry, could you repeat that?

::turns up phone, strains to listen::

[Starbucks Anarchist]

22. I never have a problem understanding them.

Maybe it's because I grew up hearing Indian accents in my family. Then again, I can understand lots of foreign accents, so maybe that's a minor skill of mine.

[Deja Q]

23. What's even funnier is seeing, at stores,

groups of 5 fully grown Indian men, speaking poor English, to the clerk.

Why 5 at once? Surely that's going to make the clerk a bit intimidated too?

Talk about a gang bang.

Of course, they probably know some vermin would undoubtedly beat them up. Hence they travel in small groups. Seems fair.

Which is a pity. The vermin who'd be doing the beating aren't beating the right people.

The whole world is nuts.


And I'm glad my body is falling to pieces anyway. I'd rather not live to see things after they crumble.

[dysfunctional press]

31. about 75% of the time- i can't understand them...

it's very frustrating. and it's never been about a computator- my it friend fixes mine.