“All our customer care executives are currently taking other calls, We are eager to speak to you, please stay on the line, or call again later”

If you can get past the Interactive Voice Response and the numerous options that provides you, to finally get a chance to talk to a customer care executives, the above is what greets you and causes even more frustration. You probably take it as a test of your patience and after hearing the above line no less than at least 50 times (interspersed with some music), you finally get a chance to talk to the customer care executive and mention your problem.

What baffles me is the fact that for any service I try, be it my Cellphone, my Landline, my ISP, my Bank, my Credit Card, and at no matter what time of the day I call, I am always greeted with the same response. For instance I called up my ISP when the office internet connection was down at 2200 hrs the day before, and was greeted with the same message. I called them up again at 0800 hrs next morning and I was greeted with the same message. It’s hard to believe that the lines are just busy because people love to talk to the call center executives, so what are the real reasons.

To my mind there can only be the following  reasons for these excruciatingly long wait periods:

1. Either the number of call center executives  are too low in number, and the call volumes are much higher.
2. The service levels being provided by the service providers are so bad, that the entire world has something or the other to complain about.

The above is also an indication of the burgeoning services sector in the Indian landscape. That coupled with the fact that India is the center of choice for all international service providers, I think the call center and BPO industry is just not able to play catch up on the demand versus supply equation.

Saying the above, I have full sympathies with the call center executives. There are huge pressures on them. At times they need to seek permissions even to take a leak. They are trained (or monitored) to be hospitable even when the caller is abusing them on the face. Not an easy job, but it’s a job nevertheless.

In summary, I believe the management in charge of these services needs to play closer attention to the long delays which customers have to face to get their queries answered. Just telling me that my call will be answered in 11 minutes, 34 seconds and 23 milli-seconds will not ease the frustration any bit.

In this race  to make the customer your own, only the company which can provide the best service levels, be proactive on customer needs, preempt un-necessary questions being asked can make the most of the opportunities. Now even though the above line may sound cliche, I am sure the strategists will take enough input from this post to ease the woes of a consumer.