Angus Doyle

Bristol

IT Director

I now refuse to work with or indeed use any company that has opted for offshoring, I understand that it is the new business craze, at what cost to the consumer? on Average it took me three calls to get the answer I wanted whereas before I could normally do it once, frankly I found it very hard to understand what the hell the person at the end of the phone was talking about and on many occasions I had to get the call passed over to someone that could speak clearer english. While I agree that UK call centres are not the greatest and I do believe there is little to no commitment from uk call centre staff, but perhaps this is a culture thats been created by paying the absolute minimum wage.

I worked for a BT call centre as a temp a few years ago, the salary was terrible and we were treated with such contempt, there was no job security or any benefits. I can understand the attitude of the UK call centre people, they listen to the same crap all day, and then have to put up with bad management.

What I dont understand is that each time I have had to phone an American or Canadian helpline, regardless of the time, the staff are so friendly and helpful. So what is going wrong over here?

If the senior management stopped seeing these call handlers as the lowest form of life and actually treated them like assets, after all sometimes this is the first point of contact for any new customer.

Out of interest who was the first company to start all this offshoring?