CSRs need to be able to communicate properly
During the last few years, many enterprises have moved their call centers to regions of the world where the labor cost is much lower. This has reduced the cost of providing customer service to callers. Unfortunately, the customer service representatives (CSRs) do not speak English very well. In fact, they often have such severe accents that they are virtually impossible to understand. They, in turn, have difficulty understanding what the caller is saying. This situation makes communication difficult and often impossible.
One of the gethuman standards states: All operators/representatives of the organization should be able to communicate clearly with the caller (i.e. accents should not hinder communication; representatives should have excellent diction and enunciation.)
From the number of complaints that we receive each month on this topic, it is clear that very few of the overseas-based call centers are meeting this requirement.
What should be done about this? We would be interested in hearing some ideas on dealing with this. One approach would be to identify the enterprises that are using off-shore call centers where their CSRs do not communicate well. We've added an item to the gethuman customer rating form that would let us obtain this information. With this data, we would then be able to identify the enterprises that are using CSRs that are difficult to understand, and let them know that they have a problem that they need to fix.
I recently had problems with my Dell computer. When I contacted dell support there was a five minute wait till the next available person. When someone came on line i had difficulty understanding and he did not really understand my problem. The results of his help was a partially destroyed hard drive. The next call was answered by a different person with the same results.
After three more techs my hard drive was blank, and had to be replaced.
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This is a great horror story, Roger. You should vote on Dell and leave the story. Just click on the companies name in the gethuman database and leave your story. We are going to be giving prizes for the best call center stories (either awful or great experiences). In addition to story possibly winning a prize, we will be feeding the stories back to folks like Dell.
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Additional: To add insult to injury, the new hard drive Dell installed appears to have internal problems. I have used e-mail help and so far I have been contacted by three different techs with no fix. Each one asks for information on my problem. There is no followup by only one tech. Each response is by a different tech with the same questions.
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I have found when this happens I tell whoever I am talking to I want my call put back to the United States They will reroute your call upon request.
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I wish I had known this. I have had problems with both peoplepc and amazon because the person at the other end did not understand English well enough to understand my problem. I finally gave up on amazon. With peoplepc, I finally managed to bug them enough by email that someone called me.
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Joyce,
Great tip! I plan to add it to our Tips page.
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Dell Tech Support employees are *very* difficult to understand, most speaking with a heavy Indian accent. Makes "tech talk" extremely difficult. Besides that, they seem to be reading from "scripts."
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Did you tell us about this by evaluating Dell? Just click on the companies name and you will get a brief form to fill out. Takes about 5 seconds. We will use your information to get Dell to change.
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The script reading is really ANNOYING! They are usually quite unhelpful and very VERY hard to understand. I usually hang up and call back till I get someone who can speak English. I had one Indian guy, for HSBC, tell me he couldn't remove some late fees, which were the fault of the credit card company. I ended up calling someone else, an American, and he had no problem fixing the problem. That's just one of many CSR problems I've had with oversea CSRs.
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Did you tell us about this by evaluating HSBC? Just click on the companies name and you will get a brief form to fill out. Takes about 5 seconds. We will use your information to get HSBC to change.
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I am glad this website exits! I have been very leary of conducting business with a non-native speaker of English. There is just too high of a chance for miscommunication and misunderstanding on their part. I have actually had representatives tell me that I misunderstood... I think not! Perhaps some governing body (FCC ?) should regulate this area. thank you for the forum to share.
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If you want to get the FCC (or FTC) to regulate this area, your should write to your congressman. To be effective you would need to organize a letter writing campaign and get millions of consumers to write to their congressman. If you are serious about this, why don't you compose a letter and I would be willing to assist you with this. Also - if you rate each of the companies that you call on the gethuman web site, we will use the information that you provide to get them to change. Just click on the companies name and give us your evaluation. Takes less than 5 minutes.
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I have called the Hewlett-Packard line a couple of times regarding a printer that we ordered that did not work. Although the techs used American sounding names, I could tell they were in India or Pakistan. They botched the name of our office manager so badly that we did not even recognize it when the new printer arrived. Plus, they said they would send a mail label to ship the old one back within 15 days so we were not charged. Well, that didn't happen. So, I give HP call center one star out of 5. I can't control where my agency buys its computers from, but I will not be buying any more HP stuff for my home. Maybe next time I will talk to the HP techs with my best Apu accent and say my name is Bubba!
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Verizon is one of the very WORST offenders along with Sprint. I dread having to call Verizon for anything and the DSL department is the worst of all. It takes forever and being transferred from dept to dept even when you call the number you were directed to call to get to a person who can help you. THEN, finally when you get to a person who says they can address your issue (after about a half hour of telling your story over and over and being told to call numerous other numhers and being transferred numerous times within those numbers) you get a representative who doesn't speak or understand ENglish and no matter what your problem, reads from a robotic script. It's MADDENING. It's worse than an automated system! They answer you with answers that have NOTHING to do with your problem. THey don't even understand what you're talking about and God bless you if you can understand a word of what they say. Even the technicians who come to the house to hook up new Verizon service have told me that they have repeatedly complained about Verizon's impossible non English speaking staff and Verizon ignores their complaints. Maybe if enough customers change to another company and tell Verizon WHY, or if at least complained to Verizon about it, maybe they will finally do something and hire REAL customer service people who speak and understand English. The people they hire in foreign countries couldn't care less what your problem is and some of them probably don't care too much for Americans anyways.
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I have called QuickBooks many times, as I have an agreement with them to solve any problems I have with their software. I usually have to ask for a supervisor, all the CSR speak with a heavy India accent and are very difficult to understand. I am cancelling my agreement due to the lack of knowledge, and the difficuly in understanding their heavy accent. I intend to notify QuickBooks/Intuit regarding my frustration.
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I purchased a Linksys wireless router and adapter last November. I couldn't get the adapter to work so I called Linksys and not only did I have a problem communicating (India)but he continually put me on hold before asking me to try different procedures. He told me I would have to pay $9.98 for technical support so I gave him my credit card number. After over an hour he told me his supervisor said the adapter was defective and I should return it for another one.
After I hung up I thought why do I have to pay for them to tell me their product doesn't work! I called back and after going through the hoops, finally got a "supervisor" who agreed with me and told me after 5 to 7 days I would get an e-mail telling me how to get a refund. Never happened!
Long story short, I called several times over the next few weeks and always got promises and apologies from supervisors, BUT no action!
My last call, when I insisted to speak to a supervisor...the first time, I was disconnected, the second time I was put on hold for a looooong time and finally a "supervisor" answered but refused to give me his name and then hung up. Third time the tech said he sent an e-mail to "escalate" my refund. No results!
I attempted to find out another number for Linksys or an address where I could complain but was unsuccessful.
I finally just gave up and then decided to call my credit card company which I should have done in the first place. My last statement had the refund on it.
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I had forgotten to remit my AT&T long distance payment. A few days pass the due date, I received a call from them with a caller ID from South Carolina. The rep. i'd himself and the company. I interupted his 'spiel' and I said that I would make the payment 'on line' that day. He continued where he left off asking if I had access to the internet. I again said that I would make an online payment, after which he asked, "But do you have access to the internet?" This went on twice more and then he said, "Will you make the payment today"? I barely thanked him for calling and hung up. Yes, I made the payment right after.
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Today I spoke ,for the second time in a month, with TUEnergy Co employee named
Ann. I have not received a bill in almost 2 months. The operator I spoke with could not explain, only that they were having "some billing problems" . She trsf me to her supervisor Luis Gomez, who also could not explain why, only that they had "some billing p. roblems". I asked to speak to his manager(Vicky) and he refused, saying tht she "does not take calls". Says I possibly may not get a bill until mid August, which would be a THREE month summer bill. I did have some difficulty understanding both these employees, but my biggest complaint was their lack of knowledge and refusal to get answers for me.
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I am glad this website exits! I have been very leary of conducting business with a non-native speaker of English. There is just too high of a chance for miscommunication and misunderstanding on their part.
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Have you ever considered the fitness level of your customer service department? No, I’m not talking about an employee exercise program. Rather, I’m asking if your team that provides service to your clients is functioning at peak performance.
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Could you please let me know, in a laptop, the time which battery shows while running on it. Does this time keep on changing after regular interval of time. Doesn't it show exact time. I have visited many sites regarding tips and advice about your computer, but didn't find the correct answer yet.
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My cell phone provider is tracfone. All I ever get when I have to call are foreigners. I have a plan where my minutes are supposed to be added automatically each month, but it doesn't work. I have to CALL to get my minutes added. I have to press a combination of numbers on my cell phone. Then they read off about 25 numbers that I have to enter. Then I press another combination of numbers. Then they read off about 25 MORE numbers that I have to enter. After a few more steps, I *finally* get my minutes. I can barely understand each number they're spouting off bvecause of the accent. Plus, the last one asked me the security question, "What is your bet?" I was clueless. I kept asking her to repeat the question, spell it, etc. Finally I was able to ascertain that she meant "What is your pet's name?" ARRRRRRRRRRRGH
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