Foreign Call Centres - anyone got a list?

I think the conversation over the phone is the most demanding use of a foreign language. You can't check from the appearances if you are being understood. There are problems with dialog too: phasing etc. Foreigners ofter start to repeat me what they said earlier because they don't comprehend that I understood them at the first time. Obviously that's a dialog problem. I have missed the acknowledgement which they would understand in the dialog.

You didn't answer my question about whether you use manufactured products produced outside the UK; unless you are very dedicated about it I imagine you do. Manufacturing jobs have been moving out of the UK for decades, and the people who did those jobs were generally a lot less able to change their skills to do other things than an IT specialist who is presumably clever and well-educated. On the other hand, the UK as a whole has definitely benefitted from that shift; unemployment has been falling and employment levels in the UK are at an all-time high (since a lot more women now work), while on the whole we have improved our "terms of trade" in that our exports have shifted from relatively low-value manufactured products to higher-value things like financial and legal services. Call centres are a similar case, they are generally a low-value-added product except for specialist areas which are likely to stay in the UK. And there's unlikely to be any general shortage of medium to low-skill jobs because most such things (e.g. working in shops or restaurants, cleaning, driving buses etc) are intrinsically local and can't be exported.

Also most call centres didn't even exist a decade ago, so this is hardly like closing down mines or steel plants which had dominated local economies for a long time. People always tend to look at current jobs in this kind of situation, but one reason jobs come to the UK in the first place is because companies know they have the flexibility to adapt to changed circumstances. Countries like France and Germany make it a lot harder to make people redundant - but they have much higher unemployment than we do because companies are much more reluctant to create new jobs.

That would presumably not be a UK car company, since there are no UK companies that could reasonably be called large ... if it's e.g. a US or Japanese company, by your logic they should not have employed you in the first place as they should have been "protecting" US or Japanese jobs.

Well indeed. Personally I work in an area (academic research) which has always been open to international competition, and like many people in research I've been employed on a long string of short-term contracts with essentially no job security. I've yet to see anyone protesting much about pay and conditions for academics. Your former 50k pay is more than most professors get, and far more than e.g. most teachers or nurses ... why do you think that anyone owes you, in particular, a living? My impression, which you may feel is a bit cynical, is that people in IT were on a gravy train for a few years in the 90s and are now complaining that it's come to an end. If you're willing to adjust your salary expectations to a more realistic level I doubt you will have much trouble finding another job.

How long does experience in IT last anyway? I'm currently something close to a world expert in something (grid computing) that I hadn't even heard of three years ago! Pick an up-and-coming technology and you'll have no competition.

Or, larger profits/reduced losses?

Jim.

So've I, but I know they're real, the problem is the lack of people with the relevant skills, not the lack of people applying...

Jim.

those that i know of for sure...

Aviva (Norwich Union) HSBC American Express Marks & Spencer Financial Services Dell Lloyds TSB GE Capital BT Prudential Powergen British Airways (Bookings) Citigroup serveral 118 numbers

Those that i know that have said they WON'T go are....

Halifax / Bank of Scotland Nationwide Royal Bank of Scotland

Those still considering are...

National Rail Enquires

HTH

sas82

In message , sas writes

Also Smile

Which is ironic, considering the best timetable service for the UK I've come across is German -

Daytona

I don't think it's sensible to measure this against only European countries. It should be measured against the current/potential major trading partners which would include the US and asian countries.

I never said they did.

However, if a UK taxed company employs the people, wherever they are in the world, that innovate, then the UK benefits. This is a basic lesson from history

- those that innovate often don't benefit the most.

Daytona

I think you will find that the new National Rail timetable engine [1] is much better than the old Railtrack one.

Whilst every man and his dog thinks that the DB journey planner is unbeatable for its ease of use, the problem with using it for foreign countries is that it often doesn't have the most up to date details of temporary schedule changes which the NR one (and the telephone helpline) are suppose to have. Less critically, it also has difficulty fitting in the type of train with the DB norms (for example: try and plan a UK journey with a 'bicycle' and the DB planner will often tell you it is impossible when it actually isn't).

tim

[1] or more correctly the front end configuration, the back end engine of all of them is exactly the same.

I too agree, with Identity Theft on the rise, how do you hold someone in an overseas call centre responsible for any security breaches. Personal inforamtion is of great value these days. Keep it in the UK. In the interest of security maybe Equifax, a major Credit Reference Agency would consider transferring their Sourthern Irish call centre to these shores?

I am in the process of moving a Norwich Union Insurance Policy to a company that has insisted it won't be moving its call centres overseas. Nationwide have put out a press release to this effect. James