[Merged] Internal Tech Support----> India.

[Florence]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

Well I have a different view, normally if a company does well the economy improves because more jobs are created and as such people have more money to spend, of course this wont work if the company creates these jobs abroad, how many people in india buy NTL services?

Well unless the shareholders pay to lay cable in India they can't.

[hairy_mick]

you have got to relise that the owners of ntl are not from the uk so are only interested in themselves not the uk ecomony make a quick buck and then shoot through.

[Chrysalis]

kitty LOL I like your sig

[handyman]

When I started at ntl in faults the department was staffed by about 10 ex customer service staff that where very dedicated to their jobs and very good at fixing faults. I started with 2 other permanant staff and 20 temporary staff.

The temporary staff where there to answer the expected demand from adding another regions coverage to the centre. As to be expected from temp staff non of them gave a t**s and for a few weeks the whole office was a bit of a joke. At this Point the time between incoming calls was sufficient to walk to the cafe and get food. (30 mins).

As there was a small dedicated team the level of knowledge of both the ntl systems and products was very high . Most of these original 10 are still with ntl at the moment, some managing departments now as well.

The problems started when the cable modems became more popular increasing the calls into the centre that should have gone to swansea. This coupled with the extra faults caused by buggy digital software that we could not fix and networks issues gave ntls faults 1000 calls a day.

To fix the problem they started a huge recruitment drive, from my view they lowered the levels required (both cs and techical skills) and we ended up with 70+ staff in the dept. Many of them where good but in that 70 at least 30 where not up to the job, nice people but not technically capable of it.

Ntl should have put more effort into the staff and training therfore raising the skills of the people on the phones and actually getting the job done on the first call. I dealt with 1000's of calls that should have been fixed 1st time and it was not rocket science.

Now Ntl have closed that call centre down retaing a handlefull of staff as 2nd level support and transferring the calls to other centres. These other centres such as Belshill in glasgow have had massive recruitment drives to cope with the increasing demand and this in turn has vastly diluted the skill level in the call centres.

How can this all be sorted out? Sending the calls to another country will make it cheaper but in the long run will 1000 indians do the job any better than the 300 uk people that it used to take. How many times will people have to call in before the find someone else how will take their money and provide a better service.

case in question...

Our telco line has been off for over a month now.

Ntl have been given 5 oportunities to take money from our debit card and each time they have given us a 'yes thats gone through ok'.

Due to the harmony project messing up the systems no notes have been made to support this as they cannot save notes. However there is a note on the account saying the telco line was disconnected back in december though it continued to work till mid jan. The system now has no reference to my cable modem account though my presence here using it clearly says otherwise.

I have spoke to people in Wythenshaw, Clydesbank, Swansea and Belshill and since there are no notes have had to repeat myself on no less than 10 occasions. I have have been promised that 'teamleader call backs' have been filled in but these have not been done. I have been assured that my line would be put on as a matter of emergancy but it has not been done.

I have found a Team leader (they do exist, one person I spoke to did not even know the name of his) and even have her email address, though despite my account being £90 in credit I still have no telephone line.

What is the worst thing is It takes but one 1 min call to assigments (if they even exist now) and the line could be active in 10 mins.

I cannot believe that this sort of thing goes on and that ntl still think the best way to handle increasing volumes of calls is to increase numbers in centres. What they need is training and lots of it. Ditch the computer diagnostic systems that are used because they are not flexible enough to cope with the diversity of calls.

One final winge I'm certain that there is a still a known fault that stops digital subscribers from whaching PPV, I'll bet it presents with a error not too dissimilar from 1020 and I'll bet there are ntl faults people that still won't even bother to check to see if the customers account is enabled for PPV before sending a pointless 'hit' and telling the customer to call back in ten mins if its still not working.

Sorry for hijacking the thread but it makes be sick knowing there are better ways of dealing with this and ntl cant get its head out of its ar*e and see it.

Mark

[Nemesis]

The thread has been "cleaned". Please can we stick to the topic. This was specifically about an INTERNAL department being outsourced to India. This does NOT affect the customer.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by Nemesis

The thread has been "cleaned". Please can we stick to the topic. This was specifically about an INTERNAL department being outsourced to India. This does NOT affect the customer.

sorry, but somebody has to say it so I may as well take the flack. This may be a non customer facing department that has been outsourced but the quality of the outsourced department may have a knock on effect which DOES affect the customer.

[Ignition]

Not that anyone in mid-rant will care but is it worth mentioning that it wasn't an ntl department that was outsourced. Desktop IT support was already outsourced to IBM and the ntl support was moved to IBM India from the UK offices.

So... it stayed with the same company, has no effect on ntl customers only staff, and wasn't done by ntl...

Of course why disturb a good rant shop with facts

EDIT: Honestly this doesn't affect customers in any way, we still have onsite desktop support. Knock-on effects amazingly minimal, just logging calls and first line support that's been moved.
__________________

Talking of which the coffee machine on the 2nd floor near our office has been broken for a while, the extra effort of having to go to another coffee machine is killing us.
Anyone wanna rant about our coffee machine repair?

[orangebird]

Originally Posted by Ignition

Not that anyone in mid-rant will care but is it worth mentioning that it wasn't an ntl department that was outsourced. Desktop IT support was already outsourced to IBM and the ntl support was moved to IBM India from the UK offices.

So... it stayed with the same company, has no effect on ntl customers only staff, and wasn't done by ntl...

Of course why disturb a good rant shop with facts

EDIT: Honestly this doesn't affect customers in any way, we still have onsite desktop support. Knock-on effects amazingly minimal, just logging calls and first line support that's been moved.
__________________

Talking of which the coffee machine on the 2nd floor near our office has been broken for a while, the extra effort of having to go to another coffee machine is killing us.
Anyone wanna rant about our coffee machine repair?

[Florence]

As the Staff feel this is just for them will all customers who feel they have something to contribute to the thread about Call centres in India please use this thread that then leaves this to NTL Employees I hadn't ever thought I would see the day that it would became a Emplyee or customer only but it seems to be so now.
Thank you all for your help but please leave this for them and post in ours.

[orangebird]

Originally Posted by Kits

As the Staff feel this is just for them will all customers who feel they have something to contribute to the thread about Call centres in India please use this thread that then leaves this to NTL Employees I hadn't ever thought I would see the day that it would became a Emplyee or customer only but it seems to be so now.
Thank you all for your help but please leave this for them and post in ours.

Kits, it's not about 'employee or customer'. It's about correcting the trail of this particular thread. The tech support info in this thread has NOTHING to do with customers, and will not affect them as such.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by orangebird

Kits, it's not about 'employee or customer'. It's about correcting the trail of this particular thread. The tech support info in this thread has NOTHING to do with customers, and will not affect them as such.

OB, with all due respect, all NTL staff and outsourced services are there to provide one thing, a set of products and services that are sold to customers. The thread was started by Neil posting an article which appeared on the Register. I know very well that the outsourced department is only to help NTL staff with problems with their PCs, etc but if that support isn't up to scratch it CAN affect the internal workings of NTL and COULD have an impact on customers. The outsourced support may well be first class and we as customers may never be affected by this change, I don't know. However, if the support is in the same class as what some customers say they are getting from outsourced customer facing support then it must impact on the internal workings of NTL and ultimately the customer. I have never had contact myself with any India based customer facing support so cannot comment on it.

[orangebird]

Originally Posted by ianathuth

OB, with all due respect, all NTL staff and outsourced services are there to provide one thing, a set of products and services that are sold to customers. The thread was started by Neil posting an article which appeared on the Register. I know very well that the outsourced department is only to help NTL staff with problems with their PCs, etc but if that support isn't up to scratch it CAN affect the internal workings of NTL and COULD have an impact on customers. The outsourced support may well be first class and we as customers may never be affected by this change, I don't know. However, if the support is in the same class as what some customers say they are getting from outsourced customer facing support then it must impact on the internal workings of NTL and ultimately the customer. I have never had contact myself with any India based customer facing support so cannot comment on it.

I appreciate what you're saying There's no problems as far as I'm aware about out internal IT support going to India. I have contact with them on a daily basis and have noticed no decrease in quality of service. How about moaning about sub standard service when it actually happens? Rather than complaining about a process that is NOT customer facing, never will be and is not affecting the ultimate service the external customer receives?

I think title of this thread is incredibly (OR DELIBERATELY) misleading too IMO.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by orangebird

I appreciate what you're saying There's no problems as far as I'm aware about out internal IT support going to India. I have contact with them on a daily basis and have noticed no decrease in quality of service. How about moaning about sub standard service when it actually happens? Rather than complaining about a process that is NOT customer facing, never will be and is not affecting the ultimate service the external customer receives?

I think title of this thread is incredibly (OR DELIBERATELY) misleading too IMO.

OB, I am not moaning about sub standard service or complaining about a process that is not customer facing. I am trying to correct the statements that you keep making that this change will not impact on the service a customer receives. Anything that happens within NTL has the potential to affect customers. Even a toilet that the cleaner hasn't cleaned properly, a badly made cup of tea or an argument a CSR has had with the car park attendant can affect customer service.

[Nemesis]

Originally Posted by orangebird

I think title of this thread is incredibly (OR DELIBERATELY) misleading too IMO.

Thread title altered.