CléaGirl With Near-Incomprehensible Accent (GWNIA): Hi Kleeya, how are you today?
Cléa: (Ugh…) Fine.
GWNIA: I’m calling from APhone Company. How is your mobile phone service?
Cléa: Awful. You people can’t get my bill right. You’ve called me last year for a special offer and you still can’t adjust my bill me properly. I’m fed up with calling you every month to try and get it fixed.
GWNIA: Er… Um… Er… you have problem with bill?
Cléa: Yes. You can’t ring people with offers and when they accept them, you can’t deliver on the service.
GWNIA: Er… Miss Kleeya…
Cléa: (Oh F*ck… get my name right, for a start!)
GWNIA: As mn grble mmmjurt, I’m clmwweing –
Cléa: I’m sorry, I don’t understand you.
GWNIA: As a valued customer, I’m calling to offer you a special deal on your internet connection.
Cléa: No thanks.
GWNIA: For $xx a month –
Cléa: I’m not interested.
GWNIA: (Pause) Mannyol plobremmm thw—
Cléa: I don’t understand what you’re saying.
GWNIA: You have problem with you APhone internet?
Cléa: I’m not with APhone internet.
GWNIA: Who is your internet with, Ma’am?
Cléa: (You’re dead meat for calling me Ma’am!) None of your business. I don’t want to change providers.
GWNIA: But this is special offer.
Cléa: So you’re going to make me a special offer that your billing system can’t handle and you expect me to either swallow it or waste an hour every month trying to get it fixed? That’s not a good deal.
GWNIA: (Pause) Er… Um… Er… thank you.
And you’re welcome. Glad I made your day. I hope this was a recorded conversation and your supervisors were listening.
When will corporations wake up and realise that offshoring vital services such as customer service and sales only serves to frustrate existing and potential customers and drive them elsewhere?
You pay peanuts, you get Mannyol plobremmm.
Tags: cbmused, customer service, offshoring, sales
Yes, I know what you mean with this outsourcing of customer service. I get it for other facets of a corporation’s work, but customer facing probably isn’t the wisest idea. It’s like having me call French customers. Oh wait, I do that.
Thankyou, and come again.
ROFL
HA! I love how your first thought was “ugh.”
You know what’s worse? When they call and my parents answer and say, “Hold on,” and CALL ME TO THE PHONE!! WTF is that????
You had a lot more patience with GWNIA than I would have.
But then again, I luv my Caller ID — and if I don’t recognize the number or it’s obviously a sales call or what-have-you, I don’t even pick it up. I hate talking on the phone anyway. lol
I think I’ve talked to that very person! I prefer the tried and true Jerry Seinfeld response of asking them to give you their personal number with the caveat that you’d be happy to call them back a little later. That always seems to fluster them as they quickly realize how mortifying it would be to get a random call from you (a stranger) at their home.
Egan: Actually, I don’t get it for other aspects of the work, and I speak from experience. But you, calling French customers, ce n’est pa pareil.
Gboy: This time it was from another country. But I’ve spoken with Apu’s before. Massive frustrations ensued.
EM: She couldn’t even pronounce my name right. Lucky I didn’t say more than ugh!
As for your parents, that made me laugh but only because mine allowed some Mormons in one time and we couldn’t get rid of them. Granted it was a long time ago, but parents… Mum still gets befuddled when people come door knocking.
LB: She rang on my mobile, and I have to answer that. No one has my landline except family. But I prided myself this time for confusing her from the start. Like you, I hate talking on the phone.
GSR: Although I was never a fan of Seinfeld, that was the one and only thing I praise him for. A piece of genius. As for trying that on GWNIA, she wouldn’t have understood me.
So what don’t you get about using cheap(er) labor for other job duties? Sadly it’s a fact of life. Hell, that’s probably why I have a job because I think the kid selling lemonade on the corner makes more money on a Saturday than I do in a week.
I get outsourcing of different facets of a business. I do – especially when it comes to US workers vs offshore workers. In my particular company that I was just laid off from, customer service and processing are both being outsourced. And when you take a look at the onshore employees, there is no question as to why the company has taken that route. The offshore contractors work for less money and the company doesn’t have to pay benefits. In addition to payroll decreasing, productivity increases – these offshore contractors want to work. They want this job and the measly paycheck that they are receiving? They are happy with it. It puts food on their table and clothes on their back.
In my old company, the majority of our onshore employees are lazy. They’ve become complacent and think that they are untouchable. Unfortunately, in this economy, it’s coming to bite them in the ass. Their laziness is now their downfall – because not only are the processors/customer service reps in India taking a smaller paycheck but they’re working harder for it than the US worker.
So yeah, I get it. But I don’t like it. But the reason I don’t like it goes deeper than anger at jobs being outsourced out of our country. It has to do with the general attitude of a United States worker.
Obviously, this is just my opinion based on what I’ve experienced when it comes to outsourcing. I don’t like it and while companies are saving money in the short term outsourcing their work to cheaper labor, I do believe in the long term it’s going to really hurt them.
Egan and SM: I wasn’t going to address the specifics of offshoring in this post but since you both have, I’ll add my views. Keep in mind that I’m not at liberty of providing more detail so I hope it all makes sense.
I don’t get that local organisations put up with the low output, poor quality, high error rates, wasting time of their local resources (hence costing more $) and the language/communication issues that are often used as scapegoat to mask offshoring incompetence, and so on. Employers may be drawn to the low cost initially but I have seen organisations cancel projects after wasting $$ offshore due to the poor delivery I mentioned above. Some chose to continue with dud projects to save (their) face after realising their strategic blunder thereby allowing the project to go completion, then spent massive $$ locally to fix offshore mistakes. Lucky that some local organisations learnt from others’ mistakes and gave the idea the flick.
Moreover, offshore organisations have little understanding of the local nature of the business, its laws and governance. For example, when I called up regarding my issue with the phone bill that I mentioned in this post, the GWNIA I spoke to did not understand how the basic tax affected the bill, and I, the customer, had to waste my time explaining it to her. That is definitely NOT customer service. Take this and apply it to a multi-million dollar project, and watch the rework being done at the local client’s expense.
As for the local attitudes that you describe, the complacency and laziness, that saddens me that your country takes it for granted. I can’t say that it’s the same here or to the extent you describe. I have seen a local company bust its ass trying to win a project and compete with offshoring rates, while still providing the best resources in the country on a tight budget and timeframe. They didn’t win and eventually they went under. The client went with an offshore proposal, and after a few of months of non-delivery, they sacked them.
Your lemonade kid may be getting paid more than you and I but I assure you the offshore worker isn’t.
Hmm, interesting points you’ve raised. I guess I’ve seen incompetence in my office when it comes to understanding the local issues and global issues. However, I don’t think we’re talking apples to apples based on your example. Thanks for delving into this topic.
Egan: Probably different types of apples, some would be imported.