Is Cheaper Better?

In the past, I have written about the importance of having individuals that not only have good customer service skills, but excellent communication skills as well. A growing trend for warehouse and third party logistics companies is to outsource their telephone call center personnel to a foreign country. Companies are finding that it is more cost effective to transfer this service to an organization that can perform this function cheaper.

I recently encountered one of these “more cost effective” outsourced call centers. The transaction was so frustrating that I actually cancelled my order. Why? The individual on the phone line spoke broken English that was so bad, that I could not understand what the she was saying and when providing my information, I had to repeat myself several times: slowly spelling my name and address several times. Had the distribution company taken certain precautions, the company would not have lost my sale as well as, I am sure, others.

If you hire a call center outsourcing company to take care of your customers, you should consider the following:

• Get referrals for call center services from organizations that have outsourced their call center services
• Find out what sales training the call center company provides to their call center employees
• If possible, you should observe the sales staff in action. Does he or she portray a professional telephone demeanor? Is the personnel knowledgeable about the product and service? Does the staff do an effective job at cross selling related products?
• Make certain the call center staff is proficient in communicating in English
  

Outsourcing the call center function can seemingly be cost effective for your company, but you should consider the drawbacks such as customer frustration caused by poor communication and negative public relations that you may encounter because of unfavorable sentiment due to outsourcing labor outside the US.