Moving the Call Centres to back UK?

Question

There were a number of suggestions a while ago that BT were likely to move at least some of the call centre work back to the UK. It seems to have gone quiet about this.
Having just had a long tussle with some of our Asian friends on behalf of a client (there was eventually a satisfactory outcome after a number of calls when I eventually got to speak to someone in the UK who solved the issue in a couple of hours), I wondered if anyone knows whether it is going to actually happen . . . ?

Answer 1

jjgraphics wrote:
You must have been very lucky with the BT Indian call centres.
Possibly, though I've only ever delt with them as a customer, and apparently not as often as you have. I can only speak as I find, as do you.
The quote from Sir Keith Watson, although historic, typifies the daft attitude in many businesses that price is the most important aspect of any service. It is not. Efficiency is most important and efficiency normally leads to lower costs. It is crazy to outsource these jobs to another country when we have people unemployed in the UK, many of whom would be pleased to have a call centre job.
My view is that if people could understand the call centre staff better and if the call centre staff were properly trained to do their job so that each problem was dealt with more efficiently and in a shorter time, far fewer staff would be needed and there would be no need to outsource the service to a country where a significant number of the staff are simply script readers have no real idea what they are doing.
All true, but all business owners/managers/company directors would disagree with you - the one's I've met anyway. Especially when it comes to price, and keeping business costs down, especially the costs of employing staff, or for that matter the costs of actually manufacturing a product in this country!
The key problem in this country has been that call centre jobs, like so many other jobs, are classed as a low paid, minimum wage, **bleep** job that no one really wants to do. Combine that with shift working, or unsociable hours, and you have a lethal cocktail that no UK worker will touch unless it's extremely well paid, their desperate to work, or the DHSS are forcing them to take the job at gunpoint! £5.80/hour simply won't cut it, and all you'll end up with is a high turnover of staff. And in that sort of working environment you can forget staff training! The people who are supposed to train either won't bother or only give you 5 minutes of their time and then watch you sink or swim. I mean, if this person is only going to stick around until they can get another job, or get pissed off and leave, or until they get knocked up by their spotty boyfriend and end up becoming a single mother living on benefits, what's the point in wasting the companies time, money and breath training this person? Plus, on top of that, you would also have to pay the UK employees national insurance, probably provide them with some sort of pension, maternity pay...
I saw this first hand, 15 years ago, in the electronics industry. This is why so many UK jobs have gone abroad. Employers simply can't get the quality of staff they perceive they want at the right price, plus the costs associated with running a business here are considered to be too high.
Sad, but true.
Does anyone know anything about the move of the call centres back to the UK?
Have you tried directly asking the moderators this question?