Poor Piggy

[handyman]

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

I dont see what the problem is,

Then you must be very lucky then, I worked in tech support for ntl and 15 mins is very conservative for a call time. Yes you do get some very easy cals with some customers that have used a computer before. Imagine taking your gran through 1st finding a spare usb port then through a tricky install on a cable modem then try that 20 times a day.

From what I have heard of piggy she is a excellent tech support operative. remember her old sig on nthw.com where she had how many people she'd converted from usb to ethernet.....

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

and possibly a bit of sour grapes because things have changed and the job isnt as "cushty" as it used to be etc etc etc.

Or a experienced member of staff that provided excellent service thats going to go elsewhere because of this. Thats the problem with this country we have the talent but we are afraid to pay it properly and stand for good service. Why dont we just give up and send all the jobs outsourced and not give a toss at all.

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

Manpower are a good company to work for, you just need to understand that you are NOT irreplaceable.

I dont care which company it is, outsourcing will never ever be able to provide proper customer service. It will always be 100% call handlng focused with no priority given to quality of service.

Every outsourced contract worker will have a stock list of 'who to blame lines'

I'm sorry its not us its 'bt'
I'm sorry we are trying our best but its this 'contractor'

What the customer wants is a solution to the problem from the provider of the problem. It makes me so mad that the management of ntl will never ever see this.

Please apply these comments to any outsourced call centre , garlands etc.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by timewarrior2001

I dont see what the problem is, I work in 1st line support, we have a 5min average call length.
25 agents supporting 140,000 users. we hit and smash our targets, green right across the board, GOS is 96% and thas after a major software release on monday.

The average length of call will depend on how complex the thing you are supporting is. It also depends on the understanding of your users. If you are supporting one software product on a computer maintained to set specifications, it will take less time to diagnose a problem than if you are supporting multiple programs on a customer's PC where you don't know the setup

For instance, the average call may well be "My Internet doesn't work". There could be any number of reasons for this (ranging from modem/line failure to firewall configuration and any spyware on the computer). It's entirely feasible it could take longer than 15 minutes to get the customer's connection working.

One other thing. I don't work in telephone technical support, but I do lab-based technical support for students. If a student has a problem, it is entirely feasable that I will spend more than 15 minutes with them. Having said that, some of the software we support is extremely complicated, and between the 6 of us, we support around 30-40 applications in many areas (multimedia, web design, maths and stats, programming, database applications and MS Office).

Now I understand that to fix everything takes time, however if they are timing the calls, then i asume theres a 2nd and 3rd line support route? We use these, only about 60% of calls we get COULD be a first time fix. and I think we are actually hitting about 50% of these.

There is quite possibly a second or third line support route. However, bearing in mind it's NTL we are talking about, they have probably done it on the cheap.

Oh yeah and incidently I work for manpower also.

Any disciplinary action has to have reason, if thye even tried to disciline him for call lengths he would appeal I would hope. I didnt appeal and took my first and final written for abusing email.

Some call centres do discipline people for handling calls too slowly. My friend's wife worked in a call centre (on a complaints line for a well known travel company), and she was disciplined for spending too long on each call. This is despite the fact that in a lot of cases, she persuaded the customer to book other holidays after the company fouled up their holiday (therefore helping with customer retention).

To me it sounds more like mis-management by the TL etc. and possibly a bit of sour grapes because things have changed and the job isnt as "cushty" as it used to be etc etc etc. Manpower are a good company to work for, you just need to understand that you are NOT irreplaceable.


Also can I point out, these rules may be enforced by manpower, however they are the rules by which NTL or IBM entered into the contract with manpower, so griping at a company that is bound by the same rules is not going ot get you anywhere. Manpower dont run tech support, manpower proide the people to staff tech support.

I don't believe she (for it is a she) is complaining because her job is no longer "cushty". I've met a few people who work for NTL, and I don't think the job has ever been "cushty".

[Ben]

Its utter tosh!

My agents don't have a time frame to work on. Its the first time fix rate the customer wants and thats what I make my agent work too.

If it takes them 2 hours to resolve the call then do it - happy customer at the end of the day and thats all that matters.

and because of this our helpdesk is very slow today because we just do a fine fine job

EDIT- typo

[Graham M]

Originally Posted by Ben

Its utter tosh!

My agents don't have a time frame to work on. Its the first time fix rate the customer wants and thats what I make my agent work too.

If it takes the 2 hours to resolve the call then do it - happy customer at the end of the day and thats all that matters.

and because of this our helpdesk is very slow today because we just do a fine fine job

Here here!

[themelon]

The people who set up AHT targets are utterley clueless. Their Idea is to answer as many calls as possible to reduce queues.

Trouble is this is rubbish because some people will worry so much about targets they completely can not be bothered with customer service and 1st call resolution.

If every call into a call centre was dealt with correctly and efficiently (no matter how long it takes) there would be less repeat calls and a smaller queue resulting.

Its common sense, something sadly lacking.

No wonder customer service (not just ntl) in this country is so pittyful as the majority of call centres have the same or equally ridiculous call targets, every time you call a company you are being rushed through your call and everytime the person on the other end is more worried about meeting 'targets' than actually providing the service.

If the figures look good the managers are happy that everything is going great, in truth look at the reality I cant think of one large company in this country can claim to offer good customer service through its call centres. BT, Ntl, Sky, Every Bank, Insurance, ISPs, Indirect Telco ect ect they are all the same. Now that speaks a lot louder than 'targets' and 'figures'

[Chrysalis]

Well this made me think back when I last went to my landlord's office to deal with something. At the time he was onto a tech support line for his pc and was holding a cable in his hand, the tech support guy must have been asking him if it was usb or parallel type cable and he didnt have a clue, the relief on his face when I walked in and knew what it was. So its not hard to guess what tech support must have to deal with.

Also after a 2nd thought about this manpower company, I would guess NTL pay them on number of calls taken, higher calls taken = higher payment. Manpower probably want to maximise profits so have low manning and are happy people have to ring back since it keeps the work flowing and the cash rolling in, of course this wont be any good for quality of service but I think its only figures that matter at the moment. Now I realise why I so often get told to reboot and call back after.

[jonifen]

Perhaps I'll ask to speak to their TL next time and demand a first call fix - think it'll happen? :p

In my job (first line tech support for the Woolworths stores), there are no maximum call time in that the issue has to be resolved. If there was, most of us woulda been sacked long ago. The targets we should keep to arent a priority at the moment - as I'm sure a lot of you have read in the papers, the powers that be have their minds on other much more important issues at the moment... 1 of which being how we log the calls on the system

Any sort of training is a rarity and should be grabbed with both hands should any be offered. The job is mundane and boring and many of our "customers" are complete fools (I'm not commenting on their technical knowledge... its more their attitudes).

At the moment, we're busy trying to get the bosses onto the phones - let them see how much cr*p we have to put up with so they can get their bonuses each year.

because the whole of the uk is being run on venture capital we must get used to achieving our targets....

good luck getting your bosses taking any more 'ownership' than that

[Chrysalis]

Interestingly seen a snippet of one of those michael moore documentaries, he asked the ceo of nike to his face these questions.

what is enough profit?
would dropping profit from 1 billion to 0.5billion cause the company to not be able to function?
why wont you visit your factories?
(related to 1st question) why is there a constant need to increase profit every year?
(again related to 1st question) do you think profits for companies should be capped?

[georgepomone]

Hi All,
I certainly don't agree that we should get used to these things.As Homealone is saying. They always want more for the dollar. If you get used to it there is no end. Thats what outsoucing abroad is all about,It's cheaper.The more they get for their dollar the more they want.There will never be an end to that. That still is no excuse for not giving the customer the service he/she is paying for. We grumble about ntl a once great company. In this instance we are talking about IBM playing any tactic to screw the last cent out of investment. It's totally pointless if you drive the customer away.
George.

Originally Posted by handyman

Then you must be very lucky then, I worked in tech support for ntl and 15 mins is very conservative for a call time. Yes you do get some very easy cals with some customers that have used a computer before. Imagine taking your gran through 1st finding a spare usb port then through a tricky install on a cable modem then try that 20 times a day.

From what I have heard of piggy she is a excellent tech support operative. remember her old sig on nthw.com where she had how many people she'd converted from usb to ethernet.....

I wokr on the jobcentreplus contract. We have people that dont understand that your username and password arent your name and address. Yet we can still control the call, and often get a fix within 5 mins., Perhaps its down to the fact our knowledge base is usable and exxtensive?
For the record never said piggy wasnt a good call agent/tech support operative, simply pointed out that many people dont have the luxury of 10 or 15mins to diagnose and resolve a problem and manage perfectly well.
We support hardware, software, servers, consumables, telephony.
SOftware we support:-
LMS, Vantive, windows 2000, CMS, FAO, SCRAS Secure dial in, Radia.
We support all PC systems, All laptops, we support servers of varying kinds including Unix based servers. We support mobile telephony, landline telephony, ISDN connections, Broadband connections. Yes often we do refer to the likes of BT The user does not know this, its done internally, but what can I do if its a line fault? How can I fix a server in devon when I'm based in Durham and the server has blue screened? So we HAVE to use contractors, and they are not bound by the same SLA's as we are. So we use our case management skills and manage the case upuntil we have agreed closure with the user.

Or a experienced member of staff that provided excellent service thats going to go elsewhere because of this. Thats the problem with this country we have the talent but we are afraid to pay it properly and stand for good service. Why dont we just give up and send all the jobs outsourced and not give a toss at all.

The trend these days is to outsource, the main reson for this isnt because its better for the compnay doing so. Many companies have a crap network, have a crap knowledge base etc, they chuck the contract out to a 3rd party, get everythign sorted out and then pull everythign back in house. Instant upgrades, instant trained staff, instant knoweldge base......see what I'm getting at?

I dont care which company it is, outsourcing will never ever be able to provide proper customer service. It will always be 100% call handlng focused with no priority given to quality of service.

Every outsourced contract worker will have a stock list of 'who to blame lines'

I'm sorry its not us its 'bt'
I'm sorry we are trying our best but its this 'contractor'

What the customer wants is a solution to the problem from the provider of the problem. It makes me so mad that the management of ntl will never ever see this.

Please apply these comments to any outsourced call centre , garlands etc.

But it isnt just about customer service. Whats the point in having every call fixed at FPOC if there are hundreds of thousands of users that cant get through to an agent? that isnt customer service either.
Companies are looking for a balance, and it seems as if NTL with Manpower have decided that if you havent got a fix after 10 mins then its either unlikely you will in the next 5 mins or so or that the customer needs to do some checks and let you take the next call.

Whats the point in sitting and waiting for a user to re-boot? what can you be doing in that "dead time" I often ask as first question, have you re-booted if they say no, I will ask them to do it and then do the rest of the techy questions and fill in the event log.

If people feel they can no longfer woprk under these conditions then they have little choice other than to leave or move on to second or third line support.
Yes its sad that someone that is a good agent can feel this way, but as I said before, NO ONE is irreplaceable, there could be someone just as good as piggy or possibly even better waiting for a chance to get a job.

For the record I actually feel the same way at times, I'm sick of my workplace and think that there should be a number of changes, but I'm a telephone mopnkey, I'm a pleb, i'm the lowest of the low in tech support. I am replaceable, threatening resignation is only going to get me laughed at.
Does it affect me offering the best posisble customer service/fault resolution I can? No, I just simply get on with my job and do what I can.

As I said, before its not me trying to be harsh with piggy, but she has to realise that things have now changed, the old ways have gone, probably not for good. If she can stick it out, she may find that things relax a little. But for the time being she has to show that she can do what every other agent does and that is keep the call length down. If she feels that its time for her to move on (see the thread where I whinged the other week) then its probably best that that is what she does.



Also as far as manpower is concerned, they dont get paid per calls taken. Manpower are a recruitment agency, nothing more nothing less. They get paid per agent they supply, they are paid 10 of whatefver per agent and pay that agent 6 of whatever. If 10millions calls com in one month, and 5 million the next it makes no difference to manpower.

[Matth]

Inevitable when you measure one aspect only - others will suffer... the other good example in the health service - set a maximum queue time, and those likely to pass the limit will be given precedence over those in greater need of treatment.

If speed is measured but not statisfaction / resolution, then it'll be the usual Windows trouble resolution ... small problems... reboot, large problems... re-install.

Welcome to the world of the bean counter, knowing the price of everyting and the value of nothing ... certainly not the value of a satisfied customer!

[Chrysalis]

If manpower are not paid per call taken, then I am at a loss why they have such policies. Sorry but I dont agree with the argument that if it cant be solved in 10 mins then its better for the customer to go away and come back that is complete nonsense.

[poolking]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

If manpower are not paid per call taken, then I am at a loss why they have such policies. Sorry but I dont agree with the argument that if it cant be solved in 10 mins then its better for the customer to go away and come back that is complete nonsense.

Manpower are a recruitment agency, they just supply staff. Do you know how recruitment agencies work?

[Chrysalis]

I know how they work in thoery, but do you have the inside details of the contract between them and ntl, its highly unlikely. eg. do manpower have their own callcentre (like hays for british gas) or are they recruiting staff inside a ntl call centre. When I worked for hays, the company got paid for volume of work done.