am i being racist? icalled up to report a fault with my broadband?

Question

it was an asian gentlemen dealing with my querry and no matter how slow i talked he could not understand me surely bt should only use employees that can talk on the phone i dont mean to cause offense but am i right?

Answer 1

You're not being racist at all. this is a problem i face all the time. Granted people of any race should have the right to work anywhere they want - but when they are paid to spend the day helping customers down the telephone when they cannot speak or understand the language of the customers this becomes a problem...

I've found whenever i call clients ISP's or hardware vendors, it can take up to 20 minutes to even get passed the "whats your name, and what company are you calling from" stage...

I dont have a problem with any race, with any people or anything like that, but I can understand your frustration all too well.

Answer 2

I don't know, are you being racist? The phrase 'Asian Gentleman' sounds like maybe you may be scared you are. And do you speak unaccented English which other Brits can understand? Cos you maybe were making his life more difficult by talking with a strong regional accent he couldn't cope with.

But whatever they come from, call centre staff have to be understandable to their callers... have you ever called a Glaswegian call centre? Or a Scouse one? And if they don't understand you is it a race thing or a lack of your language thing... either way a call centre that can't understand it's customers is not going to work long term for the company.

But it saves the company money in the (short) term which is all that accountants think in.

Answer 3

I am an Asian too and the company should employ people that can understand English accent. You know otherwise it's a problem for both the customer and the Call center agent. No offense there brother. Yeah but there is one offense!!!!
You have posted your question in the wrong category! LOL

Answer 4

This is not a matter of race so don't worry. It would be racist if he could understand you but you did not want to speak to him because of his accent but the problem here is that you could not communicate with him. It as such does not matter from which country he comes, you are merely saying that employees of BT should be able to understand their consumers, no matter what the reason for their unability to do so. This goes for anyone of any country and is not limited to race, creed, sex etc - he as an individual could not understand you and so your complaint as a BT customer is not an issue of race.

Answer 5

This is not a racist issue.

Indian English is almost another language.

People living in London cannot believe that some of us who have never been out of the Buchan Bible Belt have never met a foreigner!

Often the problem is that they are ill trained and also 'dinnie ken whit wir sayin'.

I personally do not like doing business with companies who ship off British jobs to third world places so as to pay the locals less than the going UK rate. It smells to me of the economic arguement for the slave trade or the forced migration of 'coolie' labour in Africa and old Ceylon.

Change your broadband supplier.

Answer 6

Absolutely. Im with BT and had the same problem,although in my case I couldnt understand them,them being an Asian lady. I politely told her I couldnt understand the accent and had to terminate the call. Also a similar prob. when I ordered my Comp from Dell.

Answer 7

I have had good and bad from BT, One young lady kept saying 'I cannot hear you' and cut me off, but I got a charming man who spent at least 10 mins explaining the problem and it was fixed.....
I agree though, a basic understanding of English is required, but don't forget there are so many regional accents in England...have to tried to understand an excitable Scot or Geordie.....

Answer 8

I think there are a lot of us that think like this. It is not racist - it is just trying to be understood. People are frustrated enough with tech problems - then getting somebody that can hardly speak English just adds to the frustration.
We can thank the big tech companies for outsourcing all their support out of the country. At least Dell listened to cooperate and educational customers and brought that support back to the U.S.

Answer 9

well i totaly apreciate where your coming from and no its not racist to say that one person has an issue. i was with bt and spoke to people there many times and was ok with them. In fact the one we did have a problem with is when my sister was being impatient and rambling on and on and not working with the rep that the rep just kept saying I don't get you or misunderstood. And my sis went and kind of spoke really slowly like " I. Am. get ting an er ror mes sage..." and still they were unhepful until I took the phone and expalained calmly and patiently to them what the issue was and it got sorted in two mins.

Problem there was that my sister has a heavy accent and when there is the slightest of issues she goes in full steam ahead having a go and rambling on and being impatient. I agree that in some cases yes they need to get used to accents, as I don't particularly have one (born and raised warickshire lad!) that particular person was fine with me. Aagin when your impatient with them from the start its not helpful either.

I work in a contact centre a mile from where I live in warickshire and I get proper english speaking people come through and although I clearly heard what they said I can't understand them cause they go on and on about something and its all over the place. So its also a matter that we need to understand that we need to be clear and patient to get the message accross. Spitting out jibberish isn't going to help anyone.

I had a problem with Talk Talk the other day, and it wasn't the english that was the matter although I agree it needs working on. The reason why for six months I wasn't able to sort out my stuff was because, like ALL companies, they look on their screen for answers and they hardly know the stuff themselves. So its also a matter of training them up in the job, however I can see that by not training up the 1st point of contact and making us run through the trouble shooter from scratch each time with them generates more revenue for them. It was only when i got transfered finaly to secondary support that the guy within 30 secs of me explaining the issue gave me the answer I needed, and he was indian and his english wasn't bad but not good, but I reckon because I was patient, considering I waited 6 months, and diddn't go on about the irrelevent issues we got things sorted.

Mind you I called Bt up a couple of times from sisters and the ppl on those two occations were scottish or far north england like newcastle or something and I literaly could not work out what they were saying and had to ask them repeat a few times. you could say I've had better calls to companies whos contact centres are based in India or far east.

So don't slam the ppl of india cause that is kind of racist but its ok to say managment needs to train them to kow the job to near enough technical support level and yes they need training in understanding regional accents and we also need to be patient and clearly and properly without offending give the info without aggression as the person on the phone didn't mess up your settings. If you want to complain about that your best off writing or emailing in.

Answer 10

Customer service representatives in England have put the phone down on my foreign boyfriend numerous times, even though he is easy to understand. He is now too embarrassed to make a phone call. I guess it works both ways.