Do you Really Care where your Customer Service Rep is from?

One of the most amusing things I have experienced in receiving customer service was getting a rep with a “Texas” accent named “Dillon” that kept losing his “Texas” accent when things were getting kinda hot. The focus of the conversation shifted to “Your name is not Dillon and you aren’t from Texas!” In his defense, He never did say he was from Texas. But I felt betrayed. He then calmly explained to me, that he just wanted to make me feel more comfortable and that his real name was hard for “Gringos” (He didn’t say that exactly, I just used some of my artist license to make this post more fun!:) But I couldn’t let it go. I asked, “Why don’t you give me that choice?” and “You don’t need to pretend you are from Texas, it sounds silly anyway!” He then dropped his attempt to impersonate John Wayne, (Now I’m really dating myself) and told me his real name. It was so complicated my western tongue ended up getting hung up on my back teeth and nothing that sounded even close to his name came out! Learned my lesson! I agreed “Yeah Dillon is a pretty cool name! O.K. Dillon how can you help me with my issue?” By the end of the conversation. I was giving “Dillon” California surfer accent lessons and inviting him to my next bar-b-q! So really what does it matter where the service rep is from? I just want to get my problem solved, be happy and move on. I do think that some feel that outsourcing is taking jobs away from their fellow citizens and they want to keep those job at “home.” That may be the source of discontent if any. According to my new friend Pankaj Jain, CEO & Co Founder Y2innovate Technologies Pvt Ltd , who is from India and has a call center, he says that people did care much more about ten years ago. Now it’s just understood that India and the Philippines are the customer service centers of the world and people are comfortable with it. Many more companies are global anyway and it’s good to have a centralized location for the customer service. There are many benefits to that. One is consistency, another is the call centers work hard to learn and understand each culture they are working in so they can give excellent service. India for example has vast work pools so they really can pick and choose the best of the best to work. “At our company we invest a lot of time and energy to go through the candidates, only then one out of every hundred make it to the next step of the initial hiring process.” Explained Pankaj. “Once we have the final selections, then they go through at least two months of intense culture and accent training.” He continued. And that’s besides the customer service traing! I do believe accent training is important, but so is transparency. Obviously it is important to have a conversation with someone who you feel understands you and you can easily understand them. An easy name for you to pronounce too is helpful. But a Texas accent? ;) How do you feel about this? Listen in to this week’s podcast and learn about how Indian call centers are Making Excellent Customer Service the Standard!