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Press #2 for english

1K views 15 replies 9 participants last post by  busysmurf 
#1 ·
This is just my little rant of the day. I was trying to make reservations for our 12th wedding anniversary online and the website was giving me problems. So I called the "help" line. Person #1 wasn't able to help because it wasn't her dept. Person #2 who's name was "Jane" spoke very poor english. She had a very Middle Eastern accent. Obviously there was a communication barrier. I was trying to stay calm, but getting VERY frustrated, same on her end. I finally said "thank you, I'll try again on my own" and hung up.

15 min. later, after no progress, called again. Different person, same language barrier. After 10 min on the phone, the person told me I "must be computing wrong, I make no sense." I asked for an agent that spoke english as a native language. No such person.

I understand company's send call cntr jobs overseas for cheaper labor, but REALLY?!?!

Stubborn me, calls a third time. Guess what, a native english speaker!!! Problem solved in less than 5 min.

It's not that I have a problem w/ other languages, just that I don't know any others, so when I press the button for english, I get frustrated when the person on the other end doesn't.
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#3 ·
busy, have you ever dealt with recruiters? For many of them English is 2nd (3rd, 4th) language, so you have really hard time to understand some of them. Still they try to sell you. :D
 
#4 ·
I don't even bother trying the English lines anymore. I call the Spanish lines. Perk of being bilingual :) Their wait times are also always pretty much non-existent whenever I've had to call.
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#7 ·
^^ it's a USA owned company, if people can't understand the agents at their overseas call center, then why have a call center at all? How is it helpful to call a help # & not be able to understand what you're being told? If it were an overseas based company, it'd be my own prob to try & understand them.

When I finally got the answer to my question, the person said my question didn't translate well into other languages, but made perfect sense to a native english speaker. So is it my responsibility to translate my question to other languages when calling an "english" call center, or is it the responsibility of the call center to make sure their agents understand more than basic english?
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#9 ·
I've struggled with my fair share of ethic call centre reps, but you know what? Learning to deal with different people from all walks of life is a part of life. There are more important things to worry about.

The person on the other end of the line is probably just as frustrated as you are, and is doing their best in a language that isn't native to them. They've got way more barriers in everyday life just by living in a new country. All we've got is barriers with call centres, everything else is easy. Not so bad once you look at it that way.
 
#10 ·
I've struggled with my fair share of ethic call centre reps, but you know what? Learning to deal with different people from all walks of life is a part of life. There are more important things to worry about.

The person on the other end of the line is probably just as frustrated as you are, and is doing their best in a language that isn't native to them. They've got way more barriers in everyday life just by living in a new country. All we've got is barriers with call centres, everything else is easy. Not so bad once you look at it that way.

I agree, to a point. It is the responsibility of the company , whose name and reputation are being represented by these folks as call centers, to ensure that their workers really can speak English clearly. After all, they outsource this to save money, right? not to be nice and give foreigners a leg up economically. You pay them for their product, and you expect service commensurate with the price you pay. If possible, vote with your dollars.
 
#11 ·
I'm not talking about ppl who've imigrated in the call cntr example. These are ppl that live in their respective countries, while working in a department of a company that offers assistance IN ENGLISH. If it were me trying to say....book a hotel in Italy, I would expect there to be a language barrier, as there was no "press x for english" option. But since I was given the option of english, I expect to be able to speak and understand stand the conversation.

Don't even get me started on the whole "speak the language of the country you live in" arguement. That one REALLY gets me torqued up:P
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#12 ·
It's interesting, I've never had difficulty understanding even the strongest accent (be it Indian, Scottish or Jamaican) but then I grew up in really multicultural areas (and I mean multicultural, not bicultural - people from absolutely everywhere). I can see how it would be frustrating for those who can't, however - you expect it when dealing with an overseas company but if you're dealing with a local company it's pretty ridiculous if you have to experience all this. Of course, these companies do it because they can pay workers overseas a fraction of what they pay here, and often don't have to worry about those pesky things like workers' rights, 8 hour days, good workspaces and other stuff they would "at home". I really object to that - not only are these companies not creating local employment, but they're also exploiting people in other countries.
 
#13 ·
.

One of my pet peeves is not the fact that people who cannot speak/understand English fluently are answering phones when you press a number for English, it is the fact that American Companies are outsourcing these Jobs to foreign countries.
My local phone company a few years ago moved it customer service call center to India to save a few dollars, after thousands of complaints they moved it back to the US. Things like this are insulting, sorry my opinion.



.
 
#14 ·
For the ones saying we should be more understanding, don't you think the reverse should he true as well? If you are getting a job that's in another language don't you think you owe it to the customer to speak as clearly and understandably as possible?

When I worked in a Spanish language call center, we actively used certain phrases and verbiage once we knew where the caller was calling from. There were too many things that were cuss words in one country and commonly tossed around in another. We wanted to give our customers a good experience so adjusted our Spanish accordingly. Might I add that I'm a native speaker and still had to adjust things.
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#15 ·
For the ones saying we should be more understanding, don't you think the reverse should he true as well? If you are getting a job that's in another language don't you think you owe it to the customer to speak as clearly and understandably as possible?
Very much agree.

As for the accent during my college years as well as at almost all jobs I've dealt with lots of foreign people with the accent. Almost never had an issue to understand them (be it asian, indian, russian, you name it). I can think of only 2 or 3 exceptions. So IMHO it's a lack of fluent/correct English rather than accent in many cases.
 
#16 ·
KV, exactly! It's not necessarily the accent, it's the "lost in translation" affect. For growing up in the Midwest, I'm actually pretty good at understanding what's being said in other accents, considering I wasn't exposed to them until later in life.

This is exactly what happened the other night. I was redeeming points for the hotel reservation, but didn't have enough to have the entire stay paid for with just my points, so I was using the "points + cash option". On the left of the screen it said my total was "40,000 points + $80", BUT on the bottom of the screen it stated that it was 40,000 points and that I had to purchase an additional 10,000 points for the stay. The whole "purchasing points" confused me, so I called. After the first person couldn't help since it wasn't her department, the 2nd person I spoke with spoke broken english. After several minutes, I was told that to purchase the points would be an additional $140.

Same thing with call #2, I would need to purchase points to get the stay even though I was redeeming points + paying cash to get the stay at a reduced rate.

Call #3 resulted in me finally being told an understandable answer....wait for it.... the plus cash portion of the reservation WAS the purchase of the extra required points. Basically, yes I was purchasing the points BUT that's what the $80 was for.

All I have to say is this trip is not off to a good start, LOL
 
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