call center fun

[ceez]

I saw a youtube video for this game today and it's exactly what its like to work in a call center, I'm working in one now and I hate it . anyway I haven't actually played it yet because it would only piss me off , but for anyone else that works in a call center it will bring back horrible memories.

[Kenny221]

This looks fun

[ChrisD]

I almost died laughing watching that. If you have to put up with that (and I imagine you do) you have my condolences. Thanks for sharing!

[Vigilias]

You really do get to speak to some dicks when you work in a call centre!

Before I became self employed I worked in a few call centres which handled public sector and commercial contracts.

My first one was for the UK Department of Health National Help Lines. I took calls on a 24 hour service from callers concerning HIV/AIDS?Genral sexual health, Drugs and Alcohol. Ohhhh the stories I could tell! The guy who found an antacid in a call box and thought it was a narcotic. When I told him it was just something you can get from pretty much any shop and that it was for acidic stomachs etc, he said he was going to take it anyway. Did he expect me to plead with him not to!?

The elderly lady who rang at about 2am and was worried about her risks of being exposed to HIV after seeing blood in the chilled meat section of the Supermarket.

Or the woman who rang concerned about her drinking. She drank half a bottle of white wine with a meal once a week but her husband had convinced her she had a drink problem. Her husband on the other hand sank two bottles of Whiskey a day and liked to control where his wife went, how long she took, who she spoke to and what about.

Then there was a pay-as-you-go mobile phone contract. Some of the callers really did take the breath away.

One guy wanted to know why his phone wouldn't work and volunteered that he had cleaned it only the day before. When he said cleaned, he meant that he had totally immersed his handset in soapy water. Another guy found his phone blocked and when I got his details on my screen there were numerous notes that read "Malicious call to 999", "Nuisance call to emergency services." More than a monitor screen depth of these notes. I had to tell him that he would now probably have to buy a new hand set and was lucky if he didn't get a visit from the Police.

Then one Sunday afternoon following lunch I got the strangest call. A guy said he had been waiting nearly half an hour for someone from my department to call him back to change his mobile number. Odd, because we didn't ring the customer. the customer had to ring us, we'd take a few quick notes and patch him through to the help desk in another part of the country.

When I got his details up on screen and checked his Data Protection information I saw that he had only in the last forty minutes registered his hand set and got his number. Still, if he wantd his number changing that was up to him but depending on why it could have cost in the region of £37 - unless he had been receiving malicious calls and had a Crime Reference number from the Police, in which case we'd do it for free.

When I asked him why he wanted his number changing he told me that "The last three numbers of my mobile number is 666 which is the mark and number of the beast as foretold in the book of Revelations in the Bible and it will bring me bad luck and curses!" I thought someone elsewhere in the call centre was having a practical joke! I paused for a few moments and in that time the guy said that he knew it sounded strange and that he had arguments with his dad about it. His dad said 666 was the Number Of Man.

"The number of man?" I asked. The number of man because we grow six feet tall, live for six decades and we are buried six feet down. I thought they were both as mad as a sack of spanners. However, I as able to set the guys mind at rest when I told him that in the last ten or so years, a fragment of what we now regard as the New Testament had been found which was even older than all the others and that in that text, the mark and number of the beast was 616. Saying that, I probably did my company out of £37.

When you work with the public, you're bound to encounter some strange folk with some even stranger world-image. Call Centre KPI's prevent you from exploring their madness in any depth.

"If we take a photo of you in a compromising position with a vacuum cleaner and a mango, we may use it for quality and training purposes."

[Kenny221]

The game was fun, though I beated it on the first try XD

[Vigilias]

I just want to add something else, my thoughts on contact centres.

We're using them more and more. I don't think thee is a single service or product that doesn't have a call centre behind it, especially telecoms, utilities and financial services.

When you need to call a contact centre you ideally want to speak to someone who not only speaks your language but is familiar with the subtle nuances of your language. I once voiced my irritation at "Having to go all 'round the houses" just to get to the right department for my query. The guy in the Indian Call Centre wondered why I had taken a trip around the streets where I lived before calling.

There is an increasing trend in the UK to farm out or out source our call handling work to places like India, Singapore and even the Philippines. This may save on the wages bill, a British worker can not compete with someone in Bangalore who is prepared to work for the equivalent of a few pounds a day. It certainly doesn't save on your telephone bill or your stress levels as you play musical options before you get to speak to an advisor.

When you do get to speak to an advisor the main problem is the accent. Some accents are so thick that the advisor and caller might as well be talking different languages.

Another problem is that foreign call centres don't give a crap about the quality of service their agent provide, just as long as the target is being hit and the KPI's are satisfied. Every call centre I worked at had strict quality control measures in place. Either your managers could and did listen at random to your calls, listened to a set number of calls to give you as an agent feed back at the end of the month or the calls were recorded. It's quite rare in the UK that you'll get a sarcastic call centre agent because they know they're all being monitored. Poor or incorrect advice or call handling can and does lead to termination of that agents contract. That doesn't seem to be the case in foreign call centres.

I once had a problem with my electricity meter smart key. I used it at a shop that had newly opened but they didn't realise that their machine was not compatible with my key, usingtheir machine had the effect of wiping all the date off the chip. My key was useless and I needed to top up my meter urgently. I was told by the Indian call centre that they were only dealing with emergencies. This was an emergency to me but I understood they meant gas leaks and exposed power cables. To cut a long story short, because of the consistently incorrect information I was given each time I called (Until I finally was able to speak to an agent in a Scottish Call Centre) my energy supplier gave me £15 of credit. Multiply that by the number of people who were given the wrong information that weekend and I wonder how much money my energy supplier lost but ultimately factored on to their latest hike in energy prices.

Then there is the security aspect, We entrust call centres with all sorts of information about us which makes it really easy for an unscrupulous or disaffected call centre agent to commit identity fraud or sell our information to someone who will harvest our personal details for the purposes of identity fraud.

Think about it, have you registered your mobile phone? Given your name, age, date of birth, address, and telephone number? Do you tend to use the same password for all your accounts, including online banking? Do you have a credit or debit card linked to one of these accounts? Chip And Pin is useless against fraud when the card holder is not present - these call centres even want to CVV (Card Verification Value) number, the last three digits of the number on the strip on the back of the card.

Card and Identity fraud happens in the UK, of course it does, but when it happens in somewhere like the Philippines or India what can you do.

I feel the answer is to stop out sourcing call handling work to semi-failed states. Give British workers a chance to find work in Britain. If I was in Government, I'd certainly look at making it a legal requirement for any company operating within the UK to handle their call work within the UK also.

Also, a tip. If you ever ask to speak to a call centre agent's supervisor or manager, take that agents name and the name of the person you get to speak to and ask them if they are a supervisor/manager. Call Centres seem to have this ridiculous hierarchy of agents, team coaches, team leaders, team supervisors and team managers. A team manager is really only a supervisor. If you want to make some noise you need to be speaking to a Floor Manager.

Don't accept any crap about there being no managers or supervisors available to speak to you. There is ALWAYS a supervisor or manager about, call centres need these guys to make minute by minute decisions that the call centre wallahs/agents/drones dont have the authority to make. There is no way a call centre can operate without someone in management being present on the floor.

[tavi]

I began the video, the guys voice was annoyin me, dont he ever shut up, when does the game start

[tavi]

Totally agree vigilias, half the time i cant understand people, half the people speak in thick indian accents, a really good job for someone working on a phone! Then sometimes they cant understand you, and say "YES" even though you asked them the balance!

[Vigilias]

So the next time we buy a product or service, ask if they have a UK call centre.

If not, go to the next brand until the answer is yes.

Next time you're invited to renew your contract ask if they intend to use a UK call centre if the answer is yes, tell them you'll go with them WHEN it happens.

Sadly, I fear we'll be a long time waiting.

[ceez]

So the next time we buy a product or service, ask if they have a UK call centre.

If not, go to the next brand until the answer is yes.

Next time you're invited to renew your contract ask if they intend to use a UK call centre if the answer is yes, tell them you'll go with them WHEN it happens.

Sadly, I fear we'll be a long time waiting.

just remember what he said in the video, if you do call, be nice. you never know what type of douche bag or idiot we just got off the phone with. I deal with printers where I work, I didn't think it would be this hard, I thought it would be an easy job to take until I find another job or start on my masters degree.

I didn't thing about the people that don't know the printer has to be on to print, or that it can't print documents in black without black ink. or that kids are taking revenge on their parents by buying them brand new windows 8 computer/printer bundles and not set it up for them. I also didn't think about the people that just complain because the $40 printer they bought looks cheaply built or mad because it can't handle the 500-1000 copies a week they make.

there's plenty more but I think the best I've heard so far was the lady who complained about her scanner not working. it was working, it's just not made to scan in BC powder.