Can You Please Speak English?

What a horrible life you Americans have to endure,damn foreigners they are everywhere,you cant even go overseas anymore without running into them.

reply to post by space cadet


Can you please find something more pressing to bitch about?

What is it with this sense of entitlement? First the guy asking for "thank yous" from people on public assistance and now someone complaining about bilingual customer service lines.

What's next? Are Glenn/Rush and Co. sending goons to do undercover work on ATS?

Many companies in the UK have call centres based in places like India. In which case it's not so much that operators can't speak English - it's their accent that makes it difficult. Plus it also limits communication because they lack the cultural familiarity and nuances of language.
Sometimes 'UK based call centre' is used as a selling point. I would pay extra for this.
You get what you pay for.

I understand the OP's frustration. Language is used to communicate, wether verbal or written. Heavily accented english is sometimes very difficult to understand even living here in the US. I am from the midwest, and my first duty station in the military was in New Hampshire, for the first two weeks I was there, I had a very difficult time trying to understand some of the folks, and at times it was like they were speaking a different language. I spent some time in the Bayou's of Louisiana with the Cajuns, once again a very difficult time in trying to understand them.

Closer to home, I work in an area that requires me to travel through the inner city of a major metropolitan area, once again, because of the slang and street talk, I sometimes have a difficult time. Dealing with teenagers that are used to texting sometimes almost requires a translator on some boards I visit.

The idea is that there is only communication when both people are able to receive and send understandable messages. People that are not able to effectively communicate to their customer base should not be placed in these call center positions.

reply to post by space cadet



Well I once had a boss who was an Indian and spoke perfect English. He learnt it at formal classes many years ago. If your boss wants to have his family practice their English on you fine ( get a pay rise) But the most efficient way to learn English or any other language is a proper course like the ESOL. You get the “How” (Vocab and Phrases)and the “Why” grammar.

Me and my girlfriend play a little game with the local Dominoes, betting each other on how long it is going to take them to understand our order (the winner gets the last slice), the record so far is 19 minutes to order a large meat feast with chicken dippers and coke.

I understand foreign people having problems with having complex conversations when they have only just learned the English language but I would have thought that understanding the word pepperoni when you work in a pizza parlor would be pretty essential.

As a side note there is an older Chinese man that lives on our street that can't speak a single word of English and he has lived in London since before I was born (30 years or more), but he only ever communicates with his family and other Chinese people.

Any thread that starts with the classic words as "I am not a racist but..." is doomed to become one of those paradoxal threads.


Yes, you are!

Originally posted by space cadet
...

I was in the proccess of dispute over several medical bills that have wound up at Equifax, making it impossible for me to forge ahead with my credit record. I do not owe these bills, they were paid in April. That sounds pretty simple. I needed to know where to send a copy of the same bills marked as paid. I never understood enough from the call to even know that. I requested from the 2nd rep that the address be mailed to me.

May be a dumb question but have you talked to the company that's issued the medical bills and asked them to correct the problem with your credit?

And sorry to hear about your langauage barriers. It is frustrating to say the least, having to deal with that sort of problem.

Sorry, can't help it!

reply to post by Skittle


I don't see how it's racist to expect people whos jobs specifically center around verbal communication to be good at verbal communication.

I wouldn't want to employ someone to answer then telephone that couldn't speak the language of the majority of my customers I also would want to employ a blind photographer or a masseuse with hooks for hands. Does this make me prejudiced?

I also don't think it's racist to expect a company that makes most of it's profits from a certain country to employ people that live in that country.

Which particular race do you think people in this thread were being prejudiced against?

[edit on 14-8-2010 by davespanners]

For an insight into the Indian call centre issues, I would thoroughly recommend watching the dvd "Outsourced" a good movie about a green-behind-the-ears American who travels to India to set up a call centre.

It's interesting though hearing people's expectations on what level of English they should be entitled to. Luckily for us native English speakers English is the universal language of business and is what most people aspire to learn.

I personally think over time there is going to be only two dominant languages, English and Mandarin, and interestingly enough the Chinese government is now mounting an official campaign to eradicate any proxy English words that have snuck into the Chinese mainstream tv and media vernacular. To keep the language pure.

So, while there is some complaints about not speaking proper English, simultaneously right now there are also some complaints about not speaking proper Chinese.



[edit on 14-8-2010 by cloudbreak]

Skittles I am not racist. I take offense at you saying that because I could not communicate with this person I am a racist.
The person was responsible for begining a dispute for me. I am at their mercy at this point, and if I cannot communicate with them I have no other office to contact, that IS the office that is reporting I owe bills that I do not owe. I find it irresponsible of Equifax to not provide customer service officials who can communicate in english.

Some one asked about contacting the person the bills were owed to, that is the agency that informed me I have to enter a dispute with Equifax. I needed an address to mail the bills marked paid to, and never got it.

I don't think I was asking too much to be able to understand the person's speech. I worked in customer service for several years myself, the job
IS communication.

Originally posted by boondock-saint

I'm glad I found this thread and I agree with ya.
This is the main reason why I no longer buy .....
well I won't mention names ... but it rhymes with HP

lol

Funny you should mention that rhyme....my problem was with the same company. They need to change the name of their Customer support to Customer aggravation unit.

Originally posted by davespanners


I don't see how it's racist to expect people whos jobs specifically center around verbal communication to be good at verbal communication.

See it's thinking like that that, that gets people in trouble. We shouldn't expect people to be COMPETENT in their jobs......what do you think would happen if that occurred? You should be a lot more accommodating and understanding of others.......perhaps you should just learn to speak Hindu, I mean it's not as if you actually paid money for a good or service and should expect support.


Jeeezz

reply to post by space cadet


Your outrage should not be directed at the customer service operator who has most likely attempted to claw their way out of the poverty of the poverty of the third world.

Direct your anger at the corporations who have adopted these policies.
Your thread should be about your anger at the corporations that have implemented these staffing arrangements.

Your target is misplaced
If race is not the true issue.....

[edit on 17-8-2010 by mumma in pyjamas]

reply to post by Hefficide


This is only true, unless you consider this: We hire reps who are not capable of clear communication with our customers, to discourage future calls.

I mean, it's cable, right? It's not like you are going to quit "Dancing with the Stars".

reply to post by cloudbreak


I too have seen this.
The employees are instructed not to reveal they are overseas if asked.

reply to post by cloudbreak


double post

[edit on 17-8-2010 by mumma in pyjamas]

I really don't care who I talk to on the phone with tech support as long as they understand my problem and can fix it. Yeah it gets annoying when you can't understand them but what can you do? Somebody has to do these jobs and quite frankly I'm not going to call someone up who get's paid a ridiculous amount of money to look at the problem and just do a quick fix. The cell tech support that is local in my town gets paid 50$ an hour and you have to wait a minimum of 30 mins. the guy works in shop for 4 hours a day which does not include his 2 hour lunch break, and when I had to take my blackberry in he looked at it blew on the track ball gave it back and said yeah umm nothing I can do, try syncing it to your computer again. The problem with the phone ended up being the track ball needed to be replaced, because there was a crack or something. I`d take repeating my self 100 times over not getting service any day.

I never used to mind the language barrier with tech support as I've never had to call tech support.

Until about 2 years ago.

Long story short an incorrect address taken by the operator despite repeated read-backs cost me an obscene amount of time and money to correct. The error was definitely language based since the address "typo" wasnt even remotely English. A different work entirely that was very Asian sounding when pronounced.

If the call center happened to be in some backwoods swamp of Florida there would have been the same language barrier so this isnt strictly an international or even a non-English speaking issue.

Preferably these offices would be regional. That would be the best way to safeguard against errors relating to speech and language.

Another issue I have personally come across is the person on the other end of the phone call having no clue about streets within towns within states within the country. I've seen a ridiculous amount of correspondence and packages marked: "New Haven, USA" or "Hickory Circle, USA." A Canadian cab driver made that second mistake. I wonder if his insurance claim ever went through.

[edit on 17-8-2010 by thisguyrighthere]