Call Centers Around The Globe

The fast increase and development of call centers in countries like India, and the Philippines has put an extraordinary amount of pressure on domestic call center operations. The wages of employees in these other countries can be 50% to 80% less than the employees of the United States; this is why many companies are using call centers located overseas. Even though, the wage difference is huge between the United States and their overseas competitors there are new factors is causing the call centers of the United States to become more attractive.
Because of the cultural and language difference overseas workers are less qualified to provide the correct level of service expected by United States consumers. Disclosing personal information or highly sensitive information concerning United States customers to companies overseas is not very attractive to many people today. It is hard enough for most consumers to give out personal information on any website today, then they are learning that companies in the United States is using overseas companies to process this information.
United States corporations are learning that there is an increase in management resource required to manage overseas call center operations
There is increasing employee turnover and growing wage escalations that are threatening to make offshore locations less appealing.
In India, jobs in call centers are no longer uniformly seen as an attractive career path because there is less opportunities for advancement to managerial promotions and the relative lack of societal status. Many call center employees in India have college degrees.
Some overseas markets are becoming saturated with call centers.
In spite of the issues, the movement of call center operations overseas will continue.
“or example, IBM announced its plan to acquire an Indian outsourcing firm, Daksh eServices during April 2004. (3) The firm offers telemarketing, customer support, and data processing services to businesses and has 6,000 employees. IBM has indicated the deal is not about offshoring, but represents a “strategic foothold” that will allow IBM’s services division to offer more benefits to its clients. In 2003, our firm established a joint venture with Aurora and Associates, an Indian commercial real estate services firm with offices in Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore. The purpose of this venture was to offer service to our clients needing assistance with facilities in India.”

Some United States call center operators indicate the average expected revenue per call center employee has declined by as much as 35 percent for certain types of call center functions.

The United States economy does benefit from moving jobs offshore, because of the flow of capital and trade. “A Report from the McKinsey Global Institute estimates every dollar of costs the U.S. moves offshore results in a net benefit of $1.12 to $1.14 to the U.S. (2) In short, while outsourcing to overseas locations may adversely affect the U.S. worker, there are net benefits with respect to improved productivity, lower prices, increased exports by U.S. companies to the same overseas locations, and U.S. companies with greater profitability.”

Call centers in the United States also have to meet Government Regulations, which are now becoming stiffer. Many people are now on national do not call lists, which is causing many to look for other employment instead of call centers that make outbound calls. Inbound call centers are popular for people that enjoy this type of employment. Other incentives for call centers to their employees are bonuses for sales, and appointments that were set by each operator.

Hopefully, the United States will quit outsourcing these call center types of employment when many Americans could benefit from the employment.