How do you feel when jobs are moved to India ?

[Dandyman]

This may be of interest


www.countercurrents.org/glo-gutman260304.htm



One of the issues for this country is that if this type of work is moved overseas what short of education, investment and research and development is needed in this country ? The short-termism of much of British industry makes it, IMO, an even more potent question.

 

[Deportivo Seagull]

My opinion is that it may look cheaper on paper but once you look at the hidden costs of outsourcing (particuarly in IT) then the figures are not that different.

It is sad, China will soon start to take work off India as their labour costs are even cheaper - it will all balance itself out eventually.

I think you'll find it will go the other way, china is starting to get expensive especially if you want graduates

 

[Caveman]

I thinks its poo.

 

[Brovion]

What he said. International capitalism in action.

Absolutely. "Workers of the world unite" - as true now as when Marx first said it!

 

[WATFORD zero]

Re: Re: How do you feel when jobs are moved to India ?

Which Airline was it as I work for Lastminute.com in their finance team and have to deal with airlines over the phone daily.

I had a run in with your lot when someone in one of your offshore call centres didn't know the difference between Palma, Majorca and Las Palmas in the Canaries. Bit worrying when you are booking airline tickets

 

[sparkie]

I think the big concern is where this will lead employment in 10 years time, as in reality most jobs can be done for cheaper in a developing countries.

I think that's the whole problem, and it's something I'd seriously look at if I was starting out on a career now. Everything that can be done remotely via communications technology will be at risk within 20 years. Best to stick to something that simply cannot be done from a different part of the planet.

 

[shingle]

I am, as I type hunched over a PC in an internet cafe in Goa after having just come from Bombay or Mumbai as it is now.

There is a big difference from when I was last here 4 years ago. There seems to be a lot more money about, this I am told has a lot to do with the outsourcing of jobs from the Uk and US.

I am 50 - 50 on this one, on one hand I dont like jobs moving from the uk to elsewhere and I loathe being pestered on the phone by someone who I cant understand but on the other hand I would like to see fairer world with a more even distribution of wealth.

 

[Muhammad - I’m hard - Bruce Lee]

bloody foreigners




staying over there





stealing our jobs

 

[Simster]

I'm all for it. If it helps companies run at a profit, then that's a good thing. And if the service is shite - as it is in many cases, especially where local knowledge is required - then these companies will end up bringing call centres back here anyway, because otherwise their customers *will* desert them.

In any case, are call centres really the sort of jobs we as a nation want to protect anyway? They're fairly unskilled. I'd rather we were training our workforce in more skilled lines of work - you have to pay through the nose for a decent plumber or a plasterer because there is a massive shortage at the moment. We need to concentrate on proper vocations with the sort of job training schemes for that were abandoned by Thatcher and never reintroduced by Labour - presumably because of the cost.

 

[Cian]

I won't deal with a company when I can't understand the person that answers the phone.

So thats HP (France), Apple (France) and Sky (Scotland) gone right off

 

[e77]

A lot of IT is getting outsourced to India at the moment, which is all well and good so long as the quality is kept up.

A lot of companies (BT being a god example) are starting to bring IT back onshore because it simply didn't work.

 

[turienzo's lovechild]

its a crock of shit

call centres now give crap service which makes it meaningless phoning them in the 1st place

the person on the other end of the line doesn't have a perfect grasp of english(through no fault of their own, and it is usually accent problems rather than english problems), and are just trained to read off a screen, deviate from this, ie actually ask THEM a problem and they are clueless, they are trained inadequetly

companies are sacrificing good customer service for costs

 

[BensGrandad]

Which pub was that BG?

Was originally called The Foresters changed its name in the 70s to Pig N Tater now gone back to The Forresters, spealt wrong as pointed out to me by Ben. Its in the area known as Charlotteville near what was St Lukes Hospital now a housing estate.

 

[B.M.F]

It is not only the staff that are pissed off with offshoring work. Customers hate it as well as the clear message fron thie thread is showing. I work for a bank that has lots of offshore work and about to create more. Staff are dead set against it and will not even speak to their offshore colleagues as you can never understand a word they say. I personally will not deal with offshore callers and like most, would even consider moving to a bank that only uses onshore call centres.

We have even got an Indian girl in our team who says she can't understand the people from bangalore she has to speak to so what chance have got.

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

What a very interesting debate - one of the best I've seen on NSC in a long while.

It wasn't all that long ago when a lot of foreigners came to this country looking for jobs.

Even more recently it became "inproper" to purchase a garment known to have been made by cheap labour (sweat-shops).

Now, as more and more UK manufacturing jobs are lost forever and we become a service economy, where are all the jobs to support these people that came here 40/50 years ago (and their offspring).

I predict that the companies that use overseas labour will prosper as they look at more ways to save costs - but after India, where is the next cheap call-centre to be based.

One of the best (secure and well-paid) jobs you could now train for is ......









a plumber .... FACT

 

[BensGrandad]

.

In any case, are call centres really the sort of jobs we as a nation want to protect anyway? They're fairly unskilled.

Unfortunately the country isn't full of 'egg heads and skilled workers' and anything that provides employment and reduces the burden of unemployment on the tax payer has got to be a good move.

 

[Pavilionaire]

There are some call centres in the UK who do a good job, they're not all bad.

I saw an advert on the TV for an insurance company (Swift-something) where they portrayed call centre staff as chickens with headsets. I think that's a f***ing insult to call centre staff.

Indian call centres are shite, I even get emails from Indian accountancy firms trying to get me to sub-contract Tax Return production.

 

[Martlet]

We need to put this into context. Unemployment is at an all-time low in this country, and as a result, labour is expensive. It's inevitable that companies will look to cut costs through outsourcing where possible, and it's not harming us.

Indians who work in call centres regard it as a very honourable career, and take their jobs very seriously. Brits in call centres often regard it as an annoying stop-gap, and staff turnover is very high as a result. I know which I'd employ if I ran a company.

If people are prepared to criticise indian call centres, then they should also rail against buying cheap clothes, PCs, televisions etc - all of which used to be made in the UK and are now outsourced.

 

[Yorkie]

I worked for Yorkshire Electricity for 25 years. I started off as a clerk, then I became an accounts clerk, then it turned into a customer advisor (I knew all there was to know about meters, meter readings, direct debits, billing etc etc etc)
Then in 1993 the accounts office was turned into a call centre. In the end I was supervised by a 22 year old who hadn't got a clue about good customer service but kept on to me about taking 15 calls an hour and sticking to the script. I gritted my teeth and held on knowing that privatisation would result in takeover bids. By 2002 I was earning £17K per annum. We were taken over by NPower and the call centre relocated to Peterlee (Co Durham) where new workers were doing the same job for £10K. I got loads of redundancy money and got out gratefully.

Engineering has lost jobs ever since the 60's to the Far East with the consequence that there is very little manufacturing left in this country at all. Skilled men are being paid less than £18K to be able to compete with the East.

 

[upnorthnow]

A lot of IT is getting outsourced to India at the moment, which is all well and good so long as the quality is kept up.

A lot of companies (BT being a god example) are starting to bring IT back onshore because it simply didn't work.

No they're not, they have been progressively moving more and more of their 'customer facing' support functions to India for the last few years. Now more and more of the 'back office' functions are being moved out there as well. That is in addition to the customer solution services being provided by BT mahindra which has been used for many years.