In the outsourced call center world, occasionally and due to client protocols we are not allowed to say were we are actually located. This creates a lot of problems for call center agents especially if you're accent tells the obvious. Here's another interesting story by a Sprint customer who probably spoke with one of us here in the Philippines. To this day, I still don't understand why clients are prohibiting such things as letting their customers know they're being taken care of by a competent person from here in our country. If we're given the right tools, training, motivation and empowerment, this story right down here could have easily ended as a sale on the first call and where we are or who we are won't really matter. ( ***You can click on any of the images to see the full story***)
The customer Ms. Debbie Levitt was asking the right question in the red highlight above. I also need to ask if we are to pretend that we are from somewhere else, a non-native English speaking country, why are we not given the right tools to sell this person a phone at the advertised rate. I really believe we are just as competent as the person in NM who sold her the phone but why are we not able to sell this person what she wants on the first call?
Personally, I don't think it's our fault. If the first person, who presumably is Filipino, had been empowered with the right tools and clients support and sold her the phone she wanted, I don't think it would have mattered if we were taking calls in Mars. Small things like accents and locations really become a significant part of the ordeal when customers are not been dealt well and patiently.
Going the extra mile for each customer even if it eats up your average handle time is number one in my book! I'm sure your manager would agree.
2 comments here!:
In my company, we're always told to be proud to say that we're from the Philippines when our customers would ask us.
I'll add you to my list of links, been browsing on your blog and I find lots of entries that are very informative especially for a novice in this blog-earning business.
http://edearns.blogspot.com
Problem with some offshore accounts is that they only give out limited resource to the poor agents.
I was lucky enough to have more than enough tools when I used to work for SprintPCS (some say it's also a tool to abuse) and the catch is that I have lots of upset customers (now comes in hypertension and more stress).
Another issue to consider is that local cc's do not treat csr's as what they should be in the first place. CSR's are sometimes considered as expandable. Thus (the very high probability)losing precious resource and brainpower. Sometimes upper management feels like csr/tsr serve them and deliver the bacon to them but it should be the other way. I bet people from management will not survive being on the phone for 8 hours and getting weird rest days.
New policy should be... Happy employees (csr and tsr) will provide the metrics that mgmt needs and give the best svce to the customer or client.
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