Is the Philippines really hot with Call Centers?

sinu pong nakaka alam ng call center ng AIMS INC. gusto ko pong mag background check, baka niloloko lang kame email nyo po me ha****@yahoo.com

Same here..Makes me feel sick! Is this the best thing our government can do to promote IT here in our country? To open more call centers? Geee!!! They shouldn’t even be in the category of Information Technology.

hmn, i think for tech support they prefer India because Indians are more technically trained than Filipinos. Just same as with our business here in Dubai, our company’s main business is Web Design and development. Our CEO prefers Indians when its for codings but design wise he prefers Filipinos. As Filipinos are very much updated when it comes to style but coding wise we’re poor.

Here in Dubai, i had this bad customer service experience from a Courier company. I was talking to Indians and they dont even know what customer service is, they do not know proper transfer and proper holding. They dont know how to empathize and sympathize. They will just transfer you without even informing you where the hell they will transfer you. They love to but-in. Geez, Indians are the most horrible and frustrating Customer service rep that i ever talked to. But according to my Boss most company here in Dubai (managed and owned by Local Arabs, British, Americans, and Australians…)they prefer to hire Filipinos…next are Indians…

I was a Customer Service Rep for 3 years (McAfee and IBM) and I can say very few Filipinos are working as tech reps. I can say Indians… they are techy.. yes… but they dont have an attitude of a good representative. So I think better if there will be also schools in our country who will offer short courses for PC or laptop troubleshootin and other techy stuff so we can be better that Techy Indians.

filipinos is the only people in the world can adopt different languages… how about India? hmmm….

why?

Last week, reports came out that Apple will be opening up a tech support facility in Bangalore, India with an initial manpower of 1,500 and to double by the end of the year. Why DIDN’T Apple WENT (???) to the Philippines, I can only speculate.

THAT IS WHY!!!

Hi,
Um…as far as technical assistance is concerned, Indya can be better. The Filipinos are immature and are unsure of themselves. One thing with Indians is that they have an attitude and cannot tolerate an irritating customer. They don’t retain their politeness with an angry customer. But that attitude is not there when it comes to Phillipines.

The growth of call centers continue to be rapid, up from 72 registered in late 2003 when the Asian Call Center Review reported the Philippines as the first rank in the offshore call center industry for the Asian region, surpassing India at the second spot. From being an almost unexplored BPO territory in 2000, the call center industry has grown leaps and bounds. The Philippines Board of Investments (BOI) estimates growth rate of this industry since 2001 to 100 percent annually with less than 1000 seats in 2000 to more than 69,000 at the end of 2004.

In 2004, the Philippines already captured 20 percent of the total world market share in contact center services. The Philippine government estimates the Philippines could capture 50 percent of the total world English-speaking market in 2008. This industry, aside from contributing 12 percent in to the Philippines gross national product, is also the fastest growing provider for Filipino college graduates. The Information and Communications Technology division of the BOI reported that the call center industry experienced a growth rate of 70 percent in 2005 making it the most dynamic of all sectors in the Philippine information technology industry. It has been estimated that as many as 130,000 could be working in all call centers in the Philippines by February 2006. Accoding to industry forecasts, more than a million Filipinos would be employed in the call center industry, with more than US$12 billion in revenues in the year 2010.

Are we arguing for a cause, am an Indian and working in Manila. I see lot more positives in Manila than in India, not to undermine indian talent but….my experience is nobody is second to none. India shines in IT and Phil is great in quality. Though I have handled clients from Manila and Bangalore. US clients are more comfortable with Phillipines and UK is is fine with Indian centers… the primary reason being UK taught english to Indians and Phil had US base and still american(only south asian country having a left hand drive like in the US) the training and understanding the outsourcing world is more practical in Manila than in India, can anybody compare attrition in India and phillipines and no. of clients pulling out of each centers due to intergrity issues… I have seen few in Manila than in India. Why should channel 4 conduct a sting operations on indian call center and not in Philippines… that too for UK broadcasting… do we have answers. Lets learn from each other and find synergy, both the countries earn lots n lots of forex and this one keeps the economy growing. I have seen people from manila working in India and myself working in Manila. Lets be proud that we are the two countries very dominant in outsourcing and lets use the expertise in both countries to ensure we become a bigger and better economies.

Indian call centers are preffered by most European companies and Philippine call centers by most American companies.

Being neither Indian or Filipino. I find the Filipino accent siginificantly clearer and easier to understand than the Indian accent.

The Philippines will never surpass the number of seats that India can offer simply because the population of India is much larger than that of the Philippines. This population advantage that India has is countered by the higher quality customer service that the Philippines offers.

Unlike India, most call/contact centers in the Philippines are physically managed by Americans therefore western level customer service is strictly enforced and maintained.

In short, India can give almost unlimited seats but the Philippines dishes out beter quality. Therefore, companies that are more selective in terms of quality and service go to the Philippines while those that are after the numbers go to India.

To Mr. Kashif!

Please apply deodorant 10x everday and brush your teeth 10x. You may also gargle 15 to 10x, before you speak to us. The reason why filipinos lose their accent while speaking to your is because of your stranged smell!!!!!

Changes to dial up and prepaid helpdesks in NZ
10 August 2006

Telecom has carried out a review of its internet dial-up and mobile prepaid helpdesk operations and will be introducing changes to these operations later this month.

Telecom will begin to transfer some inbound calls to its dial up and mobile prepaid helpdesk call centre services to TeleTech and SITEL’s international operations in Manila. Dial-up calls will begin to be migrated in late August while prepaid calls will be migrated later in the year.

The calls being transferred are calls currently outsourced to the two international suppliers and are handled by Teletech and SITEL employees in Auckland and Palmerston North.

This announcement does not impact Telecom employees, and we have no plans to move any other call centre operations or services overseas at this time.

There will be no loss of jobs to Teletech and SITEL call centre staff in New Zealand. All TeleTech staff will receive additional training to allow them to assist Telecom with the growing number of calls to the Broadband technical helpdesk. SITEL staff will be offered the chance to move to other areas such as 018 Directory Assistance.

The changes for these services will meet the need for a growth in call centre operations in New Zealand, particularly at the broadband helpdesk, and will provide some cost savings.

The new helpdesk centres will retain our existing high standards of service.

We have already been trialling sending some inbound dial up calls to Teletech’s helpdesk operation in Manila over the past few months. The results have been very positive, showing consistently high levels of customer satisfaction and operational performance.

It’s funny reading the conversations above….

Come to think of it… I am a Filipino. I believe both worlds has its downfall. I do agree that we Filipinos still has a lot to work on. Indians are great with IT. We are doing good in IT field, lets try to be better.

With regard to grammar and accent, I believe that we highly surpass the Indians on this angle.

It is a well known fact that Indians have this strong accent. I believe that Indians know the English language as well, but they find it hard to put into words what they would like to express during a conversation.

Every average Filipino child can speak, write and comprehend basic english. A well educated Filipino can speak English, write English, and comprehend to English language thern excel. I strongly believe this has been our advantage. We Filipinos are highly susceptible to change…

I have worked in a call center/ contact center/ outsourcing company….no matter how you say it….it is a place where you can hear words such as phone, pc, vector launch, headset, amplifier, leads….
a place where everyone speaks using different languages… convincing the person on the other line…attending to the other persons needs….

It takes great intelligence and skills to adpt to change…to speak while thinking of what is to follow to the flow of the conversation…
to speak and think simultaneously…

It is a difficult job that both worlds have here…I commend everyone for holding on to our job!

I am a Filipino and I’d like to share with you a common comment I have been receiving from most of our American customers…

“I’m glad at last I’m speaking with a local…. I know it when I am speaking with an Indian”.

My heart leaps whenever I hear those words….imagine how can they tell when one is an Indian?? (while they have regarded me…as a LOCAL!)

Dig that! Ü

Peace one and all!!!

hey mr kashif, here’s a comment from one my us customers

“filipinos are easier to understand than indians”

comment i got when i was working in convergys for a Technical Account.

others even said indians can’t speak english.

another american told me that they had a running joke in the US about indians “whenever they here indians, they immediately hang up and then dial again…”

but some indians speak really good english, i must say.

—
and yeah, most filipinos are guilty of saying “come again”, we’re aware of that are we’re just laughing at it… we’ll correct it, don’t you worry.
—

by the way, we have mac tech support in the philippines too. and apple inbound/outbound sales and tech support.
—
i am not arguing with you mr. kashif, you’ve just kind of pissed me off… observe how your fellow indians speak first before you comment on us.
—
ba****@hotmail.com

Pinoy mentality and culture result in Filipinos being horribly inept at most things they do. They care little about customer satisfaction and are just as eager to pass on clients to other people and skip on their own responsibilities.

(to the last person who posted a reply) i would really love to give you a call but i don’t want to waste my time and money. you need to learn more about filipinos. where in the world did you hear that filipinos have chinese accent??? do you know how far china is from the philippines? or do you even know where the philippines is? i have have no qualms about indians or your capability. i was simply replying to the post of the last person about filipinos not having enough technical knowledge. there is no point in arguing who’s better at english or who’s better at the technical field. we can’t say that in general filipinos or indians suck. there are fields that we are extremely good at doing. and there are areas that need a lot of improvement. a debate that will lead no where is a debate for morons. so let’s not join the club.. :o)

hi! i’m presently employed in a call center and i like my job. i want to strangle some dumb americans who simply CAN’T understand simple instructions but hey! its part of the job. i am a tech support agent and i didn’t have technical background. i didn’t even know that there was a memory module inside the damn computer. the mind is not stagnant and everything can be learned. filipinos don’t have to go to technical schools to be equipped with the knowledge to assist customers. GOD designed our brains to be this complex to give us all the opportunity to learn. read, research, observe, apply.

have a nice day everyone!

PS: we can’t have the best of both worlds. but if you ask me, gaining technical knowledge is a lot easier than unlearning the mother tongue…

India hotter than Phillipines.
For outsourcing voice, chat, email or back-office support, visit the website of Aumenta Call Center, India.
http://www.aumenta.cc

Oh yeah and let’s not forget that India is smart in expanding to other outsourced services aside from call centers. It’s sad that our expansion to other forms of services is not as fast as theirs.

I blogged about that months ago: http://www.callcenterscript.com/2005/11/riding_the_wave_1.html

I mean even last year, India has been trying to pirate our own pilots: http://jobert.blogspot.com/2005/12/is-it-illegal-to-offer-better-paying.html

Is this like the Shawarma/Zagu craze gone hi-tech all over again?

food for thought..
my brother works for a call center company in baguio city…
their call center agents receive calls from INDIAN call center agents who puts on hold a customer from say USA, telling them they will refer them to their supervisor, which is the pinoy call center agent in baGUIO… so the baguio guy talks to the american client and in the middle is the indian call center rep…

duh?

enlighten yourselves on the subject and read The World Is Flat by Thomas Friedman…

in his book, he explains how outsourcing has benefited both the US and India. An average call center agent in the States would ask for $4000/mo and in India, it’s $1000/mo. if you’re michael dell, THAT’s a great deal.

if Friedman’s numbers are right (he published the book in 2005), then Pinoy call center agents are brutally shortchanged. they don’t make $1000, that’s for sure.

so i think the better question is, why are these companies headed for India, not the Philippines?

it’s unfair to blame it all on the wobbly political situation, which has become commonplace. if you ask me, it’s how you establish the business here…it takes a lot of time and these entrepreneurs can’t waste time. i mean whoever had to go to the government offices here to secure permits can relate.

and i agree, india’s english sucks! but they have the connections, because in the field of information tech, they are way above par. so if you’re the businessman shopping around for a call center base with tech facilities, you go to india because it’s a one-stop shop. here, on the other hand, we don’t have india’s schools of technology that bred the geniuses they have now.

but we can still make it in english writing, proofreading and transcribing services. in the states, they charge $2 per proofread page. that’s 100 bucks here! if you proofread a book, and that’s 200 pages on the average, you can earn as much as 10k, just by working at home. we have to get paypal though. but the point is, if we can’t call, we can take advantage of this phenomenon called outsourcing because no other Asian country can speak AND write english better than WE do.

pardon the length…i think i got carried away…