Call Centers an insight

Call centers started growing about 10 years ago at that time I think most of them were overseas, but more are springing up in the states. While looking for a job last summer I interviewed at about 3 of them. They were being used by marketing companies, Fast cash companies, and even the government is using them. The first one I worked at was for setting up business DSL and the one I'm working at now is connected with the government. I have noticed the overall atmosphere in the call centers I have worked at trend toward high schoolish. The people on the phones tend be college age or in their thirties. Although I'm starting to see more older people coming into the call center arena.

Working in a call center you talk with a true cross section of America. There are those people who think life is all about them and their needs. They want their information now immediately with no work involved or they want someone to come out and fix it for them. Then there are the ones who give you the information have a little bit of patience and just want to get their information with as little static in the conversation as possible. The ones I like the best are the ones with patience who are ready to work at getting their issue resolved with the help of the other person on the line who will give them their information as quickly as they can.

In the past Corporate America tried to deal with customer complaints by setting up a phone system that would automatically resolve the customer's complaint through voice promps but that didn't work out because people want to talk to people not a automatic machine thus the call center evolved. Then they tried to outsource it overseas but the language barrior caused problems. So they are back in the states and over in the UK because we needed people who speak our language and will understand the problem. Call centers are also being used in the collection business, insurance companies, and credit card companies. The biggest problem the call centers have is a high turnover rate. Most call centers pay more then minimum wage and offer benefits but since one has to deal with fustrated, angry, and rude customers the wage is just not enough to make the job worth it. Which is why collection agencys usually pay the most to their customer service representatives.

All call centers usually have a quality department these are the people who listen to the calls to make sure the customer service representative (CSR) is responding in a polite courteous manner and is resolving the problem correctly, usually the client company or the customer who is paying the contract to the call center company have a quality group also who will also listen to a percentage of the calls. All CSR's are given specific phrases or words they have to say during the conversation the quality department watches for these phrases and words, if they are not said then the CSR is marked off for not saying them. So have patience with those long end of the conversation sign off's the CSR has to say all that verbiage. The quality departments sign a contract with the contracting company to the effect that the call center will maintain a quality percentage of excellent calls. Which means a specific number of calls have to be monitored a month and have to be above a specific percentage meaning the calls have to be above 90 percent or excellent calls as far as the quality of the call is concerned. If the quality of the call percentage is not met and the number of calls is not met then the call center company is fined or not payed for their services. There in lies the reason why several call centers are in the red and no longer around. The other problem is the turnover rate each call center has be staffed with a percentage of people or they lose the contract. Which is why most call centers are always hiring and why a call center doesn't always work in a small city because they can't maintain the body count.