English as a universal language

[Quinlan]

[quote="Gandelf"]The ironic thing though Xest, is that a number of British companies are moving their call centres back to Blitain, because they were getting too many compraints from customers that they could no understandee the stlange foleign accents of the Engerish speaky Indians and Chinese. ]

LOL

very true tho. And this does not only go for call centers but also for things like indian and brazilian delivery centers. Those outsource centers are just not up to our standards yet in most cases. And yes exceptions make the rule.

[Xest]

I'm not convinced it's just the language barrier that's the problem with those call centres if my experiences with them are anything to go by. The staff in them just seem outright incompetent, I don't think I've yet to deal with anyone in the slightest bit helpful, knowledgeable or competent in over a hundred calls to these sorts of places. That's not to say call centres here are always much better but they are better to some extent at least. I don't think better English for them would really resolve the issue because their staff would still be completely incompetent and worthless.

Even then though I get the impression that's what companies want, unless you have a specific business support contract - as a test try contacting Dell and speaking to a manager, you simply can't. If you e-mail them you end up e-mailing the same call centre using the details on their site and there is no other public way to contact them. Essentially it makes them a faceless organisation so that they just don't have to deal with with you at all or resolve any issues you have, they just take your money and hide behind the incompetence of the call centre afterwards.

[Sharkith]

I already gave it . Well, not a formula, but the mathematical term is Nash equilibrum.

ahhh I knew someone had mentioned it - apologies my attention was elsewhere. Yeah game theory would work quite well, I was also thinking of applications of maybe the laws of thermodynamics. I know some people who apply those in trying to understand communication. The problem is how to deal with recursivity and feedback though.

It becomes very non-linear which I guess makes thermodynamics less useful?

[clearbrook]

you'd pee urself from laughing seeing how many peeps stop by and stay there staring

no, laaaaag is not funny

[Ovi]

I'm not convinced it's just the language barrier that's the problem with those call centres if my experiences with them are anything to go by. The staff in them just seem outright incompetent, I don't think I've yet to deal with anyone in the slightest bit helpful, knowledgeable or competent in over a hundred calls to these sorts of places. That's not to say call centres here are always much better but they are better to some extent at least. I don't think better English for them would really resolve the issue because their staff would still be completely incompetent and worthless.

Even then though I get the impression that's what companies want, unless you have a specific business support contract - as a test try contacting Dell and speaking to a manager, you simply can't. If you e-mail them you end up e-mailing the same call centre using the details on their site and there is no other public way to contact them. Essentially it makes them a faceless organisation so that they just don't have to deal with with you at all or resolve any issues you have, they just take your money and hide behind the incompetence of the call centre afterwards.

I thought my experiences with Dell were bad

Now whenever I log a call I get a follow-up call after about 24 hours from our Technical account manager to make sure I am happy with the service. I guess the time I filled out their survey and actually told them what I thought mattered.

My experience of foreign call centres is mixed, the HP server support call centre is "almost" acceptable, in that it does it's job. They are there to take contact details and a brief description of the problem, and then pass it on to an engineer to call you back. On the whole it does exactly that, just a few language issues. However one of the "language issues" I had was that they ended up with the wrong Country code to dial. Whilst the initial problem was that they didn't understand me a certain level of competency would have known what the code was, or at least to look it up!

Other call centres I only use as a last resort, the service is so bad

[Gandelf]

as a test try contacting Dell and speaking to a manager, you simply can't. If you e-mail them you end up e-mailing the same call centre using the details on their site and there is no other public way to contact them. Essentially it makes them a faceless organisation so that they just don't have to deal with with you at all or resolve any issues you have, they just take your money and hide behind the incompetence of the call centre afterwards.

A while back someone gave me these links:

http://gethuman.com/

http://www.paulenglish.com/

I haven't looked at them for a few months, but there were lists of phone numbers that you can ring that bypass automated calls/receptionists etc, so that you can get through to managers and other "top nobs".

Certainly, check the links anyway, they are quite informative.

[Xest]

Seems it's US focussed unfortunately Gandelf. Also getting a human isn't the problem, getting a human that has an IQ greater than 5 is the issue.

[Gandelf]

Seems it's US focussed unfortunately Gandelf. Also getting a human isn't the problem, getting a human that has an IQ greater than 5 is the issue.

Hmm... I'm sure there was a link for UK numbers there somewhere. Perhaps they removed it? It's probably worthwhile trawling the net to see if there is anything relevant to the UK on another website.

[Gandelf]

Here you go:- I've found the article that a friend gave to me and have scanned it using OCR software:-

Call Centre Hell.

Call centres can be the very devil. Accents which are difficult to understand, holding music and being passed from pillar to post are only a few of the annoyances. Sometimes the robot voices seem to be preventing human contact. Then there is waiting time! Rescue is at hand. By pressing the right buttons and the numbers given you will get straight through.

1. Press 0 # in quick succession then :


American Express: 01273 576576
Bank of Scotland: 0845721 3141
Barclays: 0845 755 555
BUPA: 0845 609 0111
Comet: 0870 542 5425
Halifax: 0845 720 3040
HSBC: 0845 7404404
Lloyds TSB: 0800 096 9779
Nat West: 0870 333 1933
PCWorld: 0870 242 0444
Sainsbury's Bank: 0845 305 5888


2. Press * 0 each time you hear an automated voice :


BT: 0800 800 150


These are only examples to get you interested"a fuller list is available on:

www.paulenglish.comlivr


have fun !

There are probably more numbers, if you dig deep enough.

Disclaimer: Obviously, if you decide to try any of the above numbers, then you do so at your own risk as I can accept no responsibility.

[Cryn]

Call centres, where ever they are located, suffer from the problem of transient/disinterested staff. Noone chooses to be an operator at a call centre for a career, so they have no interest in a job well done and for a lot of them losing their job from a customer complaint would be a blessing.