OT: Off shore call center workers mad at American

[rdouglass]

My $.02 on this issue.

It doesn't matter where you live or what you do for work. If your job is to support / help people using verbal communication, you better be able to understand and be understood by the people you support.

How many job requirements incude "good verbal and written communication skills". Almost all?

If they cannot communicate effectively with the person they're supposed to be helping, all that happens is the customer frustration level goes up. And that doesn't have a lot to do with technical abilities. If you're supporting English speaking people (not just Americans now but English speaking people), you better be able to speak and understand English effectively.

What they're doing with or what they'd be doing without that job is irrelevant.

EDIT: Hey, I actually agree with Fyron.

[Fyron]

Geo:

This about sums up what I was meaning to get at:

rdouglass said:
It doesn't matter where you live or what you do for work. If your job is to support / help people using verbal communication, you better be able to understand and be understood by the people you support.

=0=

rdouglass said:
EDIT: Hey, I actually agree with Fyron.

*checks the universe for signs of impending collapse/implosion*

=0=

Captain Kwok said:
You know most Indians can speak and understand English very well (considering most of the education system their is still English-based). Like Geo alluded to earlier, this is mostly an accent issue.

Effective communication ("Speaking well") involves both your ability to formulate coherent sentences and the ability of your audience to understand you. You might be very fluent in a language, but if your accent makes your speech incomprehensible to those you are trying to communicate with, you are not really "speaking well" in that context. Very thick accents are a detriment to effective communication, and are definitely a problem for support staff supporting users that have no experience with your language.

EDIT:
Of course... I probably should have read Starhawk's post before posting this... Geeze man, learn a little tolerance.

[Captain Kwok]

It's not that I disagree with your reasoning Fyron, it's legimate, but your target should really be towards the people responsible for making these decisions (to locate call centres etc) and not directed at people just wanting decent jobs with relatively good wages.

I wonder if we'd be willing to pay the extra X$ for the alternative to have "native" tech support? If your answer is no, then I don't think you have much right to complain.

[Fyron]

My answer would be yes. Unfortunately, I do not like Macs.

[Starhawk]

Of course... I probably should have read Starhawk's post before posting this... Geeze man, learn a little tolerance.

I am very tolerant of other cultures and my statement has nothing to do with tolerance of "culture" it has to do with tolerance of people who can't speak worth a damn trying to take my money away from me

And it also has nothing to do with tolerance of a culture when someone calls me THREE TIMES with an accent so thick I can't understand half the stuff she's spouting.

That would be like ME speaking to a Spanish person in Spanish....I may get the occasional word right but most of them will sound like blather to a Spanish person.

And I was also not criticizing other languages Per Se I can just understand why English is a trade language was apposed to say....uh Spanish French/Any other language with gender based designations of every object and item in their language.


And like I said clearly it pisses me off that in America there are an assload of jobs that would require that I learn to Speak Spanish fluently and with little accent in order to simply be hired. And yet an Indian woman who though probobly very good with Indian can hardly manipulate English is what I'm stuck talking to in order to find out what she wants?

And don't talk to me about tolerance when you don't know how diverse a group I have as friends mmmmmkay?

[edit]And I never said I blamed her or had anything against her in particular I just think whoever hired her is an idiot[/edit]

[Sivran]

I have no sympathy at all for the call-center workers in India complaining about Americans venting their frustrations at them. I've worked in a call center.

That is part of their job. It's called "defusing the situation" -- ie, letting the customer vent. Tech support agents--especially agents in India--should expect people to be pissed off, complaining, and generally nasty. They should let the customer get it out of their system, and then help them as best they can.

Now, if the customer doesn't calm down, or continues to swear and be generally nasty and shows no sign of wanting to cooperate, call centers have policies to deal with customers like that. Generally, they get warned at least three times, and then disconnected.

[TurinTurambar]

That's the most "on-topic" comment I've read since the first post. By the time we call for tech-support... we're already angry! Then add a thick accent and the obvious reading of a script.... pissed off. Major.

[AMF]

In all of this, might I respectfully submit that we take a second and remember Kant 101: people are ends in themselves, not means to ends. That person on the other end of the line is a person, with hopes, dreams, fears, etc…not a emotionless machine. Being nice is sometimes hard, but it’s the right thing to do. Especially when one considers how extremely fortunate almost everyone here is likely to be in relation to the average Indian, or whoever. A little perspective can go a long way.

Thanks,

Alarik

Ps: Having said that, I am the first to admit that I get extremely annoyed at people, especially when driving or faced with willful ignorance, but that doesn’t make it right to yell at them. At the end of the day, when all is said and done and I am worm food in the ground, I would hope that I have left the world a better place…and maybe being nice to others is one very minor way to get there.

[Karibu]

I think everybody should learn Finnish instead of English, Spanish or Esperanto. We have no genders on our language. We just have 14 ways to bend every word (vs. German 4). Also we don't have those confusing prepositions or words like (in, out, at, etc.) but we just attach a nice postposition after the word (those 14 I meantioned). You only have to remember that those 14 ways to bend the words are not always same with every word, but they differ somewhat unpredictably.

And best part is, that we are a nation of 5 million people with no enemies (well, Swedish but who cares about them ) or geopolitical agenda.

Now, go and write to your Senator, hush!