[LINK] Outsourcing on Today Tonight

[Adam Neat]

Outsourcing is a good thing for software development, et al, but I've
had nothing but problems with offshore call centers. 

For one particular name brand computer manufacturer who I purchase my
personal gear through (laptops and PCs), their sales force appears to be
based out of India, as well as their support division for Asia/Pac.

Needless to say, despite me paying for the highest level of support
available on a laptop with this particular company (7 day a week, same
day fault response, replacement parts and laptop within 80 countries
within 24 hours, etc etc) I've had nothing but appalling customer
service and fault resolution turn around times.

Consider replacement of a DVD burner/drive for a laptop has taken over
40 days to resolve and each time I've asked for a local, Australian
representative to call me back, I've been called by someone overseas,
stumbling with poor English. 

If executed correctly, I can see offshore call centers being an
efficient and legitimate way of reducing opex costs. But if the
resulting side effect is that the service that the call center is meant
to be offering is poor, then there is little use.

Adam

-------------------------------------------------
Adam Neat | Melbourne, Australia
email:  adamneat at anoti.com   
msn:    adamneat_ at hotmail.com
web:    http://www.anoti.com/adamneat/
-------------------------------------------------
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at anu.edu.au [mailto:link-bounces at anu.edu.au] On
Behalf
> Of Adam Todd
> Sent: Wednesday, 18 February 2004 9:38 PM
> To: link at www.anu.edu.au
> Subject: [LINK] Outsourcing on Today Tonight
> 
> 
> I gather some linkers caught the story on Today Tonight this evening
about
> India being the world call center and Australian jobs going for the
cheap
> labor in a "third world country."
> 
> I was intrigued by the fact that call center operators are intensively
> trained in "Strine" with things like:
> 
> Australians say:
> 
>     "Barbie" which means Barbque
> 
>     "not a problem" which means you'll get around to doing it
> 
>     "she's apples" which means it's all sorted out
> 
> They were a few I caught as the camera swung around wildly.
> 
> Hmmmm.
> 
> I won't go into the rest of the issues that are pretty obvious.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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