Asian Call Centres - Page 3

Madhatter · 24-07-2006, 00:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by accymel

United Utilities used to out-source their call centres to India - blaming nightmare to understand them or they understand me altho recently i have spoken to English people so maybe they must of had loads of complaints & mishaps therefore directed to their internal organisation again.

Maybe, because I know powergen have. They did a complete u turn on it. Says in their leaflet that they had complaints and that they now see it as their customers are more important than saving a few quid by having their call centre abroad. Lets hope the rest see sense and realise that we are now going to go to companies that have uk call centres over companies that don't.

entwisi · 24-07-2006, 07:15

Now I've had experiences like the rest of you but I've also had disgusting service from UK call centres as well. e.g. some of you know I'm swapping ISPs from Pipex (ultra reliable, UK call centres etc) to Orange (because I have my mobile with them its free). My connection that should have just been swapped over became dead so I rang up to query why. Initally i get through to Uk based tech support. During the intro I introduce myself and explain that unlike most people who probably ring I know what I'm talking about. he starts reading from an obvious script and giving me what is complete twaddle for information. he's trying to tell me I should set my routers WAN to a static IP address that is a class C network(192.168.1.1) which if you know about networks is absolute rubbish. I explain to him that I do know how networks work and that actually what should happen is that their DHCP server should assign me a dynamic IP whenever i connect (and renew at predetermined time points) at this point I ask him if he knows about networks and he says "no, never had to" !!!!!!! This is a guy who is meant to help people set up their network!!!. he puts me on hold to "speak to my supervisor" and themnn cuts me off. Rang back, got a guy in india who introduced himself as Mayhur, we went through alsorts of checks, and eventually found out that instead of switching me across, BT had actually disconnected me and that a new request for a new connection had been placed , sla 10 days, so I'm currently offline at home till Wednesday. The indian guy was helpful, polite, and knowledgeable.

At work we have an offshore part of our team(Based in Manilla, phillipines) out of the 6 of them, 2 are OK, the rest struggle to understand basic concepts. We have to understand cultural differences such as where a UK resource tends to get on and do stuff, they spend a LOT of time talking, thinking, having meetings, wrtiting up in triplicate etc before they will start doing anything. In a fast moving environment such as we work in this just winds up business users to the point that they now won't accept their projects being offshored and the onshore team are massively understaffed and overworked.

claytonender · 24-07-2006, 08:06

The other important issue about foreign call centres is that jobs are being lost in this country. Why should we, as consumers put up with bad service from companies, who are trying to penny pinch by using call cntres in other countries.
I had problems last year with my water bill, I have a meter and United Utilities had estimated it wrongly.Based on my previous bills, I was being charged for the equivalent of 3 years water usage, rather than 6 months. I rang the 0845 number and spoke to a lady in India, who insisted my bill must be correct.as they did not make mistakes. I told her I would pay an amount which was approx what I thought the bill should be, but she said I could not do that. I felt that anyone in UK would have had more understanding of my query, as I had given her details of my water consumption on my previous 3 bils. So I emailed the customer service department, from their website, and put a cheque and accompanying letter (explaining why I was only paying part of the amount) in the post and asking for a number to speak to UK in future. I got a revised bill, and a number in UK to ring for any future queries.

Madhatter · 24-07-2006, 20:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by entwisi

Now I've had experiences like the rest of you but I've also had disgusting service from UK call centres as well. e.g. some of you know I'm swapping ISPs from Pipex (ultra reliable, UK call centres etc) to Orange (because I have my mobile with them its free). My connection that should have just been swapped over became dead so I rang up to query why. Initally i get through to Uk based tech support. During the intro I introduce myself and explain that unlike most people who probably ring I know what I'm talking about. he starts reading from an obvious script and giving me what is complete twaddle for information. he's trying to tell me I should set my routers WAN to a static IP address that is a class C network(192.168.1.1) which if you know about networks is absolute rubbish. I explain to him that I do know how networks work and that actually what should happen is that their DHCP server should assign me a dynamic IP whenever i connect (and renew at predetermined time points) at this point I ask him if he knows about networks and he says "no, never had to" !!!!!!! This is a guy who is meant to help people set up their network!!!. he puts me on hold to "speak to my supervisor" and themnn cuts me off. Rang back, got a guy in india who introduced himself as Mayhur, we went through alsorts of checks, and eventually found out that instead of switching me across, BT had actually disconnected me and that a new request for a new connection had been placed , sla 10 days, so I'm currently offline at home till Wednesday. The indian guy was helpful, polite, and knowledgeable.

At work we have an offshore part of our team(Based in Manilla, phillipines) out of the 6 of them, 2 are OK, the rest struggle to understand basic concepts. We have to understand cultural differences such as where a UK resource tends to get on and do stuff, they spend a LOT of time talking, thinking, having meetings, wrtiting up in triplicate etc before they will start doing anything. In a fast moving environment such as we work in this just winds up business users to the point that they now won't accept their projects being offshored and the onshore team are massively understaffed and overworked.

what do you mean because you have your mobile with them it's free?
you get free landline broadband because you have a phone on orange contract?

Madhatter · 24-07-2006, 20:10

you should use say no to 0870. com whenever you can

harwood red · 25-07-2006, 01:06

Hey noticed the new churchill advert is advertising the fact they don't outsource their call centres!!! The worm is turning

steeljack · 25-07-2006, 01:24

the thing that gets my goat when I have call in a problem is that here in California 9 times out of 10 the phone answers and the first automated response is .......for English press or say 1 ............ the folks who dont speak english should have to press 1. (dont worry it will come to the UK soon enough)

entwisi · 25-07-2006, 06:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Madhatter

what do you mean because you have your mobile with them it's free?
you get free landline broadband because you have a phone on orange contract?

If you have a Orange contract of £30 a month or more you get free up to 8M broadband(there is a cap of IIRC 2gig/month, I'll just download big stuff at work on their unmetered connection.

Likewise SKY have a deal that if you live in an area that was unbundled by easynet(who sky bought out) you can get free broadband if your subscription is over £15 a month.

Madhatter · 25-07-2006, 19:53

How would I connect to the internet using a mobile phone gprs. Any ideas?

simon · 25-07-2006, 22:35

called THREE the other day too cancel a stolen mobile phone

The lady from india informed me that my new SIM card would cost me £16 and 625 pence ?????????? I asked her many times and explained that, that was not an ENGLISH monetary amount.............

After 5 minutes all she said was it would be £16 and 625 pence and would I accept this ???????? With the police waiting for me I agreed ......

It appears the amount was £17.75 ????????????????????

simon · 25-07-2006, 22:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Madhatter

How would I connect to the internet using a mobile phone gprs. Any ideas?

Get the right phone............

Madhatter · 25-07-2006, 23:13

what do you mean get the right phone. do you need 3g?

jinxy · 26-07-2006, 11:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by glasgow guy

I dont mind the train to be honest as its £30 return first class and very comfy..and you get free grub and free drink !
I got the late train up 1 night as I was going to slovakia to watch a footy match, and I was slightly drunk to say the least by the time I hit glasgow as I was the only person in the carriage going up and the girl just left the drinks trolley by my table and told me to help myself...to save her walking down every 20 mins to serve just me !..so I did...had the lot..cider, beer, spirits..even the nibble were gone..my mates couldnt figure out how I got in such a mess from a train journey...

that was well worth your £30 train fare then lol

entwisi · 26-07-2006, 21:22

Mad, you can get 'internet' via a phone in a couple of ways, GPRS or 3G, the latter being faster, e.g. I posted to accyweb the other night using my Nokia N80 as a modem connected over 3G at 460Kbps (near broadband) and was sharing it across a wifi network to julie so she too could post. You need to connect to your phone over usually IRDA or via cable, (Unusually bluetooth doesn't seem to work for most phones when it comes to this).

You could use a GPRS connection but as its less than a 56K modem I would question why you would.

Oh, did I mention its sodding expensive! If it wasn't for me gettinga trial data allowance from Orange I wouldn't have done it , its about £1/megabyte.

Madhatter · 26-07-2006, 22:42

ah i'll get to the expense bit in a bit,
right ive got my phone connected to my pc in the barn my new office. I've got the phone connected with manufacturers data cable. what do i set the settings to on the phone to be able to connect to orange gprs, and how do I connect, I must need to set something up on the pc, and how does the phone connect to the net, a modem is permantely connected via a fixed land line but is a phone always connected ?
Explain in basic.