Audatex, formerly ADP, if you do the research is rated #1 in their industry and has been awarded numerous world class support awards. Simple Google facts would persuade me to discredit this story.

If a company has two French speaking reps, is it honestly that difficult to understand why that company would not want both employees to be occupied at the same time? I can hardly immagine french speaking technical support reps are in abundance in Michigan of all places.

Another comment, battery is indeed spelt with two “T”s, not 3, not 4. Extreme, perhaps, but consider this… If a company is holding you accountable to that degree, there is likely a reason for it. Perhaps a job requiring less attention to detail is in order… burgers perhaps. Good luck at any rate, the Michigan unemployment rate is horrible, hopefully you’re not still looking or trying to collect unemployment.

Bad product aside, it was the ethics of the call center that really provoked disdain. Everything that the main article here suggests was manifested at Stream, as though there is a single Bible for which all call centers model their ethics, standards and operating practices. I could reitterate what the main article outlines with my own identical experiences, but I will save the redundancy and tell of my own unique horrors.

Stream’s MSNTV contract went through a slash and burn stage, where they fired half of the staff on the contract for every and any reason under the sun. Unfourtunately, they miscalculated how many staff were actually needed to meet the call volume, and found that the employees who were left were not only in over their head in queue hell, but the service level was not being met. Instead of hiring new ISP’s to meet to demand, they instead decided to be creative in their way of lowering morale (yet again). They implemented weekly, mandatory overtime to each of their employees. For instance, you would complete and 8 hour shift in a day, and then they would send you home for two hours, and then expect you to return later on that night for perhaps and hour or two. The extra money made did not even compensate many people’s fuel expenses for driving there, home, and then back to work and home again. It was truly cruel and unusual punishment, and completely void of any consideration for the employees well-being or humanity.

My favourite, however, was being forced to lie to the clientel (all of whom were American, as the MSN TV is not sold outside of the US) as to our location, and nationality. When a caller asked us for our location, we were told to tell them that we were located in Seattle, Washington..In reality, as stated earlier, we were located in Chilliwack, British Columbia, Canada. Even though outsourcing is an important and contentious issue to Americans (and, to an extent, every country), the fact of the matter is that the jobs have already been outsourced, so why pretend? Im sure any American would rather get a Canadian on the phone than someone in a far away call center, located in Timbuk Tu . Instead, I made a point of telling every one who asked where we were located that, in fact, we are located in British Columbia, Canada…Most were receptive and interested to be talking to a Canadian.

Lastly, the garnish on my heavenly call center employment experience, was my unceremonious dismissal, one day before I was set to leave. Allow me to explain. I had put myself through 8 months of call center hell in order to save for a working holiday in Australia, and when I had reached my financial goal, I promptly handed in my two weeks notice. On what was supposed to be my second last day, at the END of my shift, one of the TM’s approached me, asked if I had signed off, and asked me to follow him. I entered a room with him, and another one of the TM’s (who was a complete weasel, by the way). I quickly realized what was transpiring and said “Oh, I know what’s going on here…you guys are firing me”. They said that that day, at “exactly 1:16pm, you were observed as finishing a call not using the approved call script. You were heard saying ‘Thanks for calling, have a great day’, instead of ‘thanks for calling MSN TV, have a good day’. You were then observed at 1:56 pm as taking a 16 minute break. Breaks are to be 15 minutes in length, as outlined in the employee handbook”. Do you see what happened there? Notice the TIMES of the “offences”. It’s plain to see that they had premeditated a firing, and looked for two imperfections in my performance, one after another, and fired me for it. They obviously either felt threatened that I was going to say or do something on my last day, or some other alterior motive.

This is the call center condition. It’s masochistic to work in one, and as stated already, they will never change. They never cease to amaze at their ability to dehumanize and lower morale, as well as break one’s spirit. I hope Stream Chilliwack burns to the ground.

HANDLE TiME takes an unprecedented, literary look at the innerworkings of an American Call Center; through the eyes of a former call center employee.

At about this time last year, an Indian book was relesed called, ONE NIGHT @ THE CALL CENTRE; which was poorly written and trashed American call center workers and customers pretty badly. Even so, it became the best selling book in all of India; and I understand that a movie is forthcoming.

That being said, HANDLE TiME also serves as an American response to that Indian book; as well as the very first call center fiction novel and literary testament — from an American employee’s perspective.

If you are interested in reviewing the book,please send me an email. I would be delighted to offer you a copy. The official email address for the book is

handletimefan@yahoo.com

We will also pojst the release of the book on the blog, http://handletime.ireporter.tv and on my MY SPACE page:

http://www.myspace.com/penmarric

It will be available as a book; and as an ebook — at the request of many call center employees who would prefer to read ebooks at their stations.

Thanks!

LiNCOLN PARK

I dunno. One of the greatest stress releases in the world was hitting the mute button and swearing at your customer.

Not that I ever did that.

nope.

Never. =)

Jon

Quantity vs. Quality

*that* is the call center problem, especially when you’re an outsourced call center. The call center gets paid by the call. But the guarantee on that contract is that you do a good job at it. Good leaders will recognize that customer satisfaction is the key, but good *managers* are the ones that make the company money.

Even then, in today’s big business model, the unquantifiable *always* suffers as a business grows because it is unquantifiable. You can’t really prove that you’re doing good, no matter how much logic dictates that it is good.

But, on the other hand, consider a call center. There are two options: Answer more calls quicker and solve on callbacks/email. Answer less calls and solve while you’re on the line, leaving customers in a queue waiting to get to a phone rep.

Which will produce a higher Customer Sat? Consider yourself the customer. Do you rather wait to speak to someone for an hour and (most of the time) have your problem fixed that time no matter how long it took, or would you rather wait 5 minutes just to talk to someone for 10 minutes, at which time either your problem is solved, or they need to get off the line to research the issue and get back with you (note: Obviously, the severity of the problem is key. If it is a severe problem, you would rather wait for an hour to get the problem fixed. If it isn’t, you’d likely rather talk to someone quickly, and get off the phone to go do other things)

I was in the tricky situation of trying to tell a support group that there was absolutely no way we could pull data to show that putting their techs in a newsgroup to solve customer issues would save money, since there was no way to ensure that the customer saw the answer, that the answer solved the problem, and that, even if it did, the customer didn’t just call in anyways to make sure. The unquantifiable is the core of a call center, be it insurance claims or NT Support, but it is the bane of a business.

And that’s enough babbling from this tech support vet =)