by Eva and Geoffrey Churchman

If like us, you’ve rung a big company, usually a Telco, to sort out an issue with them, only to find (after being kept waiting for 20 minutes) that the person you’re speaking to is located in a different time zone and has English as a second language, then you’ve probably concluded that they are cheapskates who don’t deserve your business.

Call centre people in the Philippines get paid about $NZ 3.70 ($US 2.25) an hour. In India at it is slightly more at about $3.90. The minimum adult wage in NZ at present is $23.50 — it’s obvious why big NZ companies employ people overseas rather than here. The problem isn’t confined to NZ of course — it is a widespread practice in America and probably other English-speaking countries.

But it’s false economy. If someone you speak to has poor verbal communication skills, is ill-informed about the technical issues, or simply speaks from a script, then you conclude that it’s a waste of your time, The employer is not going to be any better off either. About a year ago we found ourselves having to spend about an hour with an incompetent person making mistakes, which if they hadn’t been made would only have taken about 15 minutes.

If you get a call centre staffer like that, tell them you want to speak to a NZ resident. It’s not being racist, rather you are demanding efficiency.