"Sir, you're being transferred to the Philippines now"

[Hyena Dandy]

I have plenty of good friends from AT&T that work in the PH call center, they speak English as good as I do

...*whistle*


But seriously. I've probably posted here before, but I wanna say what I"m thinking now. I am fine with alerting people they're being transferred out of country. My only real CONCERN is that doing that may lead to people abusing the foreign employees.

[smileyeagle1021]

Also I worked next to a person with a thick accent who had her headset turned up too loudly so I heard the customer get mad at hearing her voice and yell, "Send me the fuck back to America!" We were sitting in Oregon. Yes the person was an American she had an accent because her parents came here legally when she was young.

Kind of like when I worked for the reservation center taking calls forwarded to us from the hotels, people would complain about the accents of some of the people at the call center (we had a lot of Polynesian employees). I finally got to the point where I asked them "did you actually listen to the person at the hotel... I've called the hotels before, and their accents make our Polynesian employees sound like midwesterners." They stopped complaining after that

[jackfaire]

One comment about in house call centers. I work in an outsourcer at this time and the clients we have tend to also have in house call centers.

We are better than them. We are held to a higher standard than they are. We have to stay on top and make sure we use current information where as if I ask for advice on a topic I can get an answer from one of their reps that at times is 5 years out of date and that is common.

It's often I have to double check an answer because they cite something that hasn't been in affect for years but apparently they are still using to make decisions.

Also I worked next to a person with a thick accent who had her headset turned up too loudly so I heard the customer get mad at hearing her voice and yell, "Send me the fuck back to America!" We were sitting in Oregon. Yes the person was an American she had an accent because her parents came here legally when she was young.

[wraiths_crono]

I have no problem with people helping me from a different time zone/country/whatever, but I'd like to understand what they're trying to tell me. If I need help with my computer or something, I'd like to be able to understand what the tech on the other end of the line is trying to tell me rather then trying to play 20 questions with what the tech said two minutes ago.

uh... I have plenty of good friends from AT&T that work in the PH call center, they speak English as good as I do the problem with companies is not the employees its the scripting, and THE REQUIREMENT to read the script as it says of you will be fired. Even here we were not supposed to skip questions when doing tech support.

[Crazedclerkthe2nd]

Wow - the cost of living differences are insane! I knew the difference was significant, but even I'm surprised.

A $500/month apartment in this city is simply not to be had. With that said, you could get away with paying $500 or less per month in rent, but you'd need roommates.

$225 per month is less than my car payment (car prices are another significant difference). I paid more than that in rent over ten years ago in a much cheaper city than where I live now.

I'm going to venture a guess you're in Ontario. As a former Ontario resident, I can attest to the high cost of living in some areas (*cough* Toronto *cough*) but it's not just big cities. K-W is expensive (used to live there too), even my birth home of Ottawa is pricey in a lot of areas.

I live in the U.S. now in a state where the min wage is $7.50/hr. That's also a pittance and it's difficult to get by full time on that (put it this way, I make more than a $1 over that and I still have a tough time keeping my bills paid). My last job (the first I got after being in this country) paid $10/hour and that seemed like a small fortune.

However, knowing the higher costs of practically everything in Canada, I can see how $10/hr wouldn't get you very far.

[Boozy]

Thanks Kimmik. That was actually more than I needed. Like I said, I was having trouble understanding if $10/hour was a good wage where you live.

[Kimmik]

Well $7.40 is the minimum wage.. I live in the Capital of Michigan.
Hell when I first started at Wally land.. I was over 8 and hour.. and min wage went to where it is now.. they gave me an increase because they wanted me a decent bit above it.
Our duplex is a 3bd 1 and a half bath with a garage and a large yard and a full basement in a "nice" area and it is 700 a month. My car payment is 200 a month.. and I think my insurance for said car is 98ish dollars.
Does that help?

[Boozy]

Actually, my car payment is a very small fraction of our living expenses. I'm saying that everything is more expensive here.

[smileyeagle1021]

$225 per month is less than my car payment (car prices are another significant difference). I paid more than that in rent over ten years ago in a much cheaper city than where I live now.

That sounds a bit like Reno... for a time it wasn't unusual for people (those who had been living in the city for at least a decade, my mother was one of them before she refi'ed to do renovations) to have car payments higher than their mortgage. I can understand the huge fluctuation in rent/mortgage expense, but I will never understand the huge difference in car expense... there are places in Utah that will sell you a new car for $188 a month... in Reno I'd praise deity to get a used for that.

[jackfaire]

Mine is based on where I work compared to where I live. I always work in places where the cost of living is higher than the cost of living where I live because with as low as I make that's necessary to be able to live on my own.

[Boozy]

Wow - the cost of living differences are insane! I knew the difference was significant, but even I'm surprised.

A $500/month apartment in this city is simply not to be had. With that said, you could get away with paying $500 or less per month in rent, but you'd need roommates.

$225 per month is less than my car payment (car prices are another significant difference). I paid more than that in rent over ten years ago in a much cheaper city than where I live now.

[AdminAssistant]

My pay is averaged out as around $10/hour (unfortunately, all TA's are salaried as if we work 20 hours/week, but we all put more time in than that. Stupid state of Kansas.) At any rate, if I were full time, it would be plenty for me to live on here. Ditto Arkansas. Hell, when I was in Jonesboro and working retail, I was living on $6.25/hour and doing okay. My share of the rent was only $225/month, and our utilities in that place weren't that expensive. But now national minimum wage is $8.25/hour.

[smileyeagle1021]

Wow, Boozy, it must be really expensive up there... down here (in Utah) $10 an hour is considered a decent wage for those without a college education, hell, a couple both making $10 an hour can live relatively comfortably in Utah. At full time that's $3200 before tax, assuming 25% tax (between federal and state, which sadly may be a low estimate) and that is $2400 after tax. Rent in Utah for apartments, nicer ones too, can easily be found for $500 to $600, leaving (if you are just doing a small but nice apartment) $1,800. Insurance in Utah aint going to be pretty (I pay roughly $150 per month), but that is made up by ample free parking everywhere and competitive dealers that can get you a lower cost of ownership. Utilities are pretty low too, despite my boyfriend's obsession with air conditioning I've never seen an electric bill over $50, and keep in mind I voluntarily pay an extra $10 per month to contribute to renewable energy. Sp. taking out insurance and utilities, that leaves you, let's say $1500 (leaving extra room for if you somehow use more energy than my boyfriend and allowing for natural gas, trash, and water), to spend on car payments, food, entertainment, savings etc...

[Boozy]

Kimmik, may I ask what state you live in, and what the minimum wage is there?

As a Canadian, I have trouble with perspective when people start talking about wages and cost of living in the US. In my province, for example, minimum wage is $10/hour and it provides nothing more than poverty-level subsistence, if that.

[smileyeagle1021]

Sorry for the OT but that always chaps me. But I have a hard time with foreign call centers because of my hearing.. I just cant make out somethings when there is a thick accent. I even had a hard time when I was a cashier with accents... which lead to some real fun times. I understand why we outsource... I just wish that I had a better ability to hear more clearly.

Really going OT on this one, but if you keep having problems understanding people on the phone, PM me, I can send you a link to the voice carry over service that the company I work for offers. We can do everything from full invisible presence where the person you are calling has no knowledge that we are there to fully announced and explained, and for that service you do not have to be completely deaf, just have difficulty hearing on the phone... in fact most of the people we do VCO for can still hear a little bit on the phone and just have us as a fall back if they miss anything.