Outsourcing, Continued

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Visitors start a lively discussion, but may be missing my point.

My “Just Say No to Outsourcing” piece has gotten a little discussion going in its comments. It appears that some readers are confusing “employ America” with “buy American.”

I’m all for the first, but have limits on the second. While I’d rather buy American-made products, I do have to spend my money where I’ll get the best value for my dollar. Nowhere is this more important than when making a major expenditure, like one for a car.

As I was growing up, my aunt was vehemently opposed to buying anything not made in the US. While that was possible back in the 1950s and 1960s, it soon became very difficult. She stubbornly stuck to her guns for a very long time, buying US-branded televisions and cameras and cars when she could have gotten better quality products, often at a lower price, from Japanese or German manufacturers. In the end, she had to give in, at least on the electronics stuff.

There was a time when the US was at the top of the game, when US-made products were technologically advanced and of better quality than you could get anywhere else in the world. But with some exceptions, that’s changed. For years, people have been recognizing that they can get more value for their hard-earned money by buying products made and marketed by overseas companies.

Personally, I think it’s tragic. I believe that America’s failure to stay at the top of the product manufacturing game is a result of laziness on the part of R&D teams and cost-cutting measures on the part of management. It also has a lot to do with pay levels, benefit packages (often required by unions), and the cost of living in this country. Even if we could make the best product in a given category — say, digital cameras — we couldn’t afford to make it or sell it. All these things combined — not to mention our smug “America is the greatest country in the world” attitude — have led to our manufacturing downfall. After all, it’s hard to make yourself better if you already think you’re the best you can be.

And things are getting worse, as goods mass-produced in China and Korea at rock bottom prices flood the marketplace, replacing quality with items so inexpensive that we can buy with the atittude that when it breaks, we can just throw it away and get another one.

I tried to buy a leather wallet in a leather goods store about a month ago and couldn’t find a single one that wasn’t made in China. It scares me when we get to the point that we simply don’t have a choice. I know now how my aunt felt when she bough her first Canon camera. But at least she was getting a quality product from an established and respected manufacturer.

Anyway, before I alienate any other readers with what will likely be taken as an unpatiotic attitude (a dangerous position to be in these days), I just want to remind readers that if they love America, they should support it any way they feel comfortable supporting it.

Although I’m not comfortable enough to buy a Ford, I’m very happy to avoid doing business with US companies that send customer service jobs overseas. And I’m not afraid to speak out against overseas outsourcing.

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Netflix

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My capsule review of the Internet-based DVD rental service.

I joined Netflix about two months ago and, in general, have been satisfied with the service. That’s not to say the relationship has been trouble-free. It hasn’t.

Netflix offers four plans for membership. I chose the cheapest plan: $9.99 per month for one DVD at a time with an unlimited number of DVDs per month. The plan is perfect for us in that it enables us to watch, on average, two DVDs per week. That brings the per DVD rental cost down to less than $2 per title — cheaper than pay per view and both cheaper and more convenient than going to the local video rental place.

Here’s how it works. After setting up an account, you browse or search the extensive movie library for titles, actors, directors, etc. that interest you. See one you want to watch? Click an Add button to add it to your Queue. Once a movie is in your Queue you can shuffle it around in the list order. The ones on the top are the ones you’ll see first, in the order in which they appear.

What’s kind of neat is that you can add a movie to your queue before it’s available in DVD — even before it’s been released to theaters. As soon as it’s available, just shift it to the top of your queue to get it right away.

In my plan, I only get one DVD at a time, so the plan is pretty simple. Netflix sends me the DVD at the top of my queue. They send me an e-mail message telling me that it’s been shipped and giving me an estimated receipt date. Since the local shipping point for me is in Phoenix, I usually get the DVD the day after it ships. So something that ships out today will be in my mailbox tomorrow.

The DVD comes in a red tyvek envelope that contains a white tyvek envelope with a sticker describing the movie. There’s no DVD case and no liner notes. Just the movie. I pop the movie into my DVD player, watch it, then pull it back out and stick it back into the red envelope, which has a tear-away portion that removes my address and replaces it with Netflix’s. I drop the envelope in the local mail box and it goes back to Netflix. It usually gets there in a day or so, depending on the day of the week. (There’s no mail service on Sundays, so that’s a dead day.) Then the whole process starts all over again.

At the beginning of this piece I alluded to a less than perfect relationship. That’s because I’ve had two problems so far:

  • One of the DVDs was scratched to the point that it would not play properly. Although most of the movie played, there was about a 15-minute sequence that was messed up, with lots of skipping forward. This is evidently a common problem, since Netflix has a customer service form with this listed as a possible reason for contact. They offered to provide a replacement DVD, but it wasn’t so bad that we couldn’t see the movie, so I let it go. Still, I’ve since looked at the underside of each DVD and have been shocked at the number of scratches on each one. Is it that the tyvek envelopes don’t properly protect the DVDs? Or are other subscribers downright careless with them? I don’t know.
  • The other day, I got an e-mail confirmation that the movie I’d returned had been received at Netflix. The only problem is, I never saw the movie. It was shipped to me and then shipped back without ever getting into my mailbox. This was a problem that was not on the customer service form and I had a heck of a time finding contact information to report the problem. Netflix responded the next day, saying that occasionally the envelopes get damaged in shipping and, when the outer envelope gets torn off, the DVD simply comes back. (Either that or one of my neighbors enjoyed the movie and graciously returned it for me.) They promised to send a replacement movie while my next selection was on its way — so I could “catch up,” so to speak. Trouble is, they sent the same movie that was next in my queue, so I got two copies of the same movie. I guess that’s what happens when you let a human take the job of a computer.

I use the “three strikes and you’re out” rule with customer service. Netflix, so far, has two strikes — in less than two months! They aren’t the only organization offering this kind of service. Blockbuster, in an effort to save their failing company, has also launched an Internet-based DVD rental service. If Netflix drops the ball again anytime soon, I’ll surf over to the competition to see what they have to offer.

Just Say No to Outsourcing

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Alamo and National lose a rental customer.

I’m going to Austin, TX in April to attend an Apple Computer event. I had to do the usual things to arrange a trip like that: airline reservations, hotel reservations, car rental reservations. I did the airline stuff on the Web — it really is easier. I did the hotel reservations by phone, calling two of the three hotels close to where I had to go. And then I did the car rental reservations by calling toll-free phone numbers.

Hertz and Avis phones were answered by folks who were obviously American based in US cities. I only had to make my request once. English is their primary language and they had no trouble understanding me. I got rates from each — Avis was $22 cheaper.

But that wasn’t enough. I also called Alamo and National. And in both cases, I was connected to someone at a noisy desk in India.

Regular readers of this blog know how I feel about outsourcing US jobs for US companies serving US citizens to foreign countries. When I make a reservation with a US company for service in the US, I fully expect the entire transaction to be conducted in this country.

Yet Alamo and National, in their attempt to save a few bucks an hour on employee costs, are willing to sacrifice good customer service. Both representatives had heavy Indian accents that were difficult to understand and, in both conversations, I had to repeat my requests several times. I told both of them that I didn’t do business with companies that outsource customer service labor and hung up on them.

Months ago, I cancelled all of my AT&T service and sold all of my AT&T stock because the company had turned over customer service to representatives in India. I’ve also cancelled several credit cards when I learned that customer service was handled overseas. I’ve stopped doing business with companies I know are outsourcing.

There’s something wrong with outsourcing US jobs to overseas employees. Every time a US citizen loses his or her job to someone in another country, the US economy gets a little weaker. There’s one less person with an income, one less person able to buy goods and services. When that person has to take a lower paying job — like as a checkout person in a Wal-Mart — the weakness remains despite the replacement job.

Am I alone in feeling this way? Are American companies so greedy that they’re willing to lose potential customers — not just people like me with principles but the people they’re leaving on unemployment lines? When is it going to stop? I’d rather pay more for goods or services to know that in doing so I’m keeping other Americans employed.

Do your part. Stand up for what you think is right. And just say no to outsourcing US jobs overseas.

Now don’t get me started on goods made in China.