Tag Archives: India

Bank of America Support Chat FAIL

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It’s actually quite fun to torture them.

This chat transcript says it all.

Current Transcript of the Chat Session
In this window hotkeys have been activated to allow for quick navigation between the chat transcript and the chat text edit areas. Alt + Arrow Up will set focus on the last text message in the chat transcript and Alt + Arrow Down will set focus on the chat text edit. An audible alert will be played when a chat agent has posted a new response.

Welcome to an online chat session at Bank of America. Please hold while we connect you to the next available Bank of America Online Banking Specialist. Your chat may be monitored and recorded for quality purposes. Your current wait time is approximately 0 minutes. Thank you for your patience.

Thank you for choosing Bank of America. You are now being connected to a Bank of America Online Banking Specialist.

Alfredo: Hello! Thank you for being a valued Bank of America customer! My name is Alfredo. I will be assisting you with your personal accounts today.  

You: Your Web site times out too quickly, requiring me to log in again and again. This is a huge waste of time and very frustrating. How can I adjust the timeout interval?

Alfredo: I certainly understand your concern regarding the Web Site.
Alfredo: May I have your full name and last four digits of the account?

You: It’s not one account. It’s all accounts. And I already entered my full name.

Alfredo: Please provide me the last four digits of one of your account and your full name?

You: I really wish they’d let you people think for yourselves and not read off a script.
You: #### Maria Langer

Alfredo: Thank you, Maria.
Alfredo: Maria, We need this information to verify your account information, It is for the security of your account.
Alfredo: To increase the timeout level I request you to please contact directly to our Online banking department.

You: The question I’m asking has nothing to do with my account. It’s your Web site.

Alfredo: They will be able to do this for you.

You: So you can’t help me.

Alfredo: Yes, I understand you.

You: So you wasted my time, made me provide information you didn’t need.

Alfredo: I really wish I could resolve this for you via chat, however, I really apologize, I do not have necessary tools to do that.

You: Why did you ask for information you didn’t need? You had my question. You could tell immediate that you couldn’t help me.

Alfredo: I request you to call at the number they will assist you with this.

You: Why did you continue a conversation that would go nowhere?
You: And what number? You didn’t provide one.

Alfredo: You can call them at 1.800.933.6262. We are available from 7 a.m. to 10.00 p.m. Monday through Friday and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday Eastern Time.
Alfredo: “Please be assured that we know your time is valuable. We would not direct you to contact us by telephone unless it were absolutely necessary. I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you.

You: Why is it that every time your Web site offers to help with a chat, no help is provided?

Alfredo: ”

You: Nice copy and paste, “Alfredo.”

Alfredo: I really wish that I can resolve this for you, However their is a separate department for this.

You: How long do you expect me to be on hold when I call that number?
You: How many buttons will I need to push?
You: Or will I need to talk to a machine and hope it understands me?

Alfredo: I regret but this is not copy and paste I actually wish I can help you with this.

You: Why is it that Bank of America continues to fail so utterly with Customer Service?

Alfredo: You will get an option to talk with a live person.

You: Is your name really Alfredo?

Alfredo: Yes, My name is Alfredo.

You: Where are you based? India?

Alfredo: I wish I could resolve it for you!
Alfredo: Yes, I am in India.

You: Exactly what I thought. This transcript will make good reading on my blog. Anything else you’d like to add?

Alfredo: I really apologize that I was not able to assist you, I hope you understand that.
Alfredo: I wish your issue would be resolved as soon as possible!

You: What I don’t understand is why BofA has a chat support feature that NEVER seems able to provide any assistance.
You: It’s a complete waste of customer time.
You: Yet so is calling them. I know I’ll be on hold for at least 15-20 minutes AFTER entering all kinds of numbers into my phone.
You: Then they’ll just ask me for the same information — like you did.
You: My time isn’t valuable to the bank.

Alfredo: I really apologies that I am not able to assist you this time but it is not like this every time.
Alfredo: Please be assured that we know your time is valuable.
Alfredo: They will be able to resolve this for you.

You: It’s cheaper to hire overseas “support” personnel in India than to employ Americans who can answer questions without reading a script.
You: Are you happy that you’ve taken away a job from an American?
You: That unemployment here is high because people like you have our jobs?
You: And you can’t even do them very well?

Alfredo: I really apologies if you think so.

You: I really think you should let your supervisor read the transcript for this chat.
You: Maybe someone will understand the frustration of BofA customers in America.
You: Maybe someone will get the idea that we don’t want to participate in time-wasting chats when all we need is someone to pick up the freaking phone and talk to us.

Alfredo: I will provide this chat transcript to my supervisor.

You: I’ll be posting this transcript on my blog. My readers will love it.
You: Anything else you want to say?

Alfredo: I request you to call at the number and they will be able to resolve the issue for you.

You: Sure, I’ll do that.

Alfredo: i apologize that you are not satisfied with our service.
Alfredo: I apologize for the inconvenience caused to you by this.

You: It’s not your fault. You’re just doing one of our jobs. We could do it better.

Alfredo: I hope you understand that it is not me to do so.
Alfredo: I regret I was not able to resolve the issue for you.

You: Well, I’ve wasted enough time with you. Now I’ll waste some on the phone. You’re free to go.

When it became apparent that he would never end the chat, I did.

I need to be clear about something here: I have no problem with Indian people. I do, however, have a problem with companies like Bank of America sending support jobs overseas to places like India just to save money. (I also have a problem with pop-up chat support offers that waste time, but we won’t go there.) This kind of policy has fed our unemployment problem.

My sister, who was in banking at CitiGroup, was a victim of this twice in the span of three years when her job was sent to India. The first time, CitiGroup found another job for her; the second time, they didn’t and she was unemployed for six months. She’s underemployed now after losing another banking job to the financial crisis two years ago.

If all the jobs we sent to India and Pakistan and god knows where else were to come back to the United States, we would have no unemployment problem and no financial crisis. We’d have no deficit, either, because all these people would be earning money, spending money, and paying taxes.

Instead, we have a crisis fed, in part, by big business maximizing profits by sending American jobs overseas.

What’s even worse, however, is the quality of the work done by these people. They often have little understanding of our language and rely on computer scripts to answer questions. The above transcript makes this very clear. My initial question could have been answered in seconds by someone familiar with the language and not required to follow a script. (I almost always get better customer service on the phone when the customer service representative is US-based. I say almost because sometimes even the Americans in the job aren’t very good; it depends on how strictly they’re required to follow a script.)

So, as a result of practices like Bank of America’s we get inferior customer service and fewer jobs for Americans.

Who wins?

Technical Support FAIL

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Staff that can read, understand, and reply to requests in English would be helpful.

Two weeks ago, I needed to access a restricted area on a Web site operated by a major software vendor with beta software I needed. I’d been given an invitation link that should have gotten me access, but it didn’t work.

After searching the site, I finally found a link I could use to send feedback. Because I’m under nondisclosure for this project, I’ve redacted some of what I sent, but you can get the gist of it here:

I’m supposed to have access to the [redacted software] beta. I got an invitation. I filled out the form and it said the invitation was invalid. My contact is [redacted contact], at [redacted PR firm]. The error code I got when I tried to get a product key following the instructions of my [redacted PR firm] contact was 2f1dc2b1-4e83-4dc5-8c3b-8988079801af. I need access to the software. Can you please help me?

Several days later, I got the following response:

Hi Maria,

The reason you are getting this error is because the [redacted acronym] with which this invitation is associated is no more a valid [redacted acronym] hence to fix this you need to follow following steps:

1. The account for which the [redacted acronym] no longer exists will need to be merged with an existing (valid [redacted acronym]) account ,
OR
2. You need to create a new registered account in [redacted service] with which, we can merge this existing account.

Thank You!

[redacted name]
[redacted company] Team

I had no freaking idea what this meant, so I responded:

This information does NOT help me. I cannot get the software. Can someone PLEASE help me resolve this? It’s been going on for nearly a week and I NEED the software ASAP.

Nearly two weeks have gone by. In the meantime, I was suddenly able to access the software. I no longer had a problem. Yet today, I got the following message:

Hi Maria,

The reason you are getting this error is because the [redacted acronym] with which this invitation is associated is no more a valid [redacted acronym]. Every invitation is associated with users valid [redacted acronym] and in your case there is no [redacted acronym] a/c showing and hence to fix this issue there are 2 steps:

1. You give us a valid registered [redacted acronym] and we will merge it with your account for which the [redacted acronym] no longer exists. OR
2. You need to create a new registered account in [redacted service] with which, we can merge this existing account.

By merging we here means that all the permissions which your original [redacted acronym] had will be transferred to this new [redacted acronym] of yours.

Thank You!

[redacted name]
[redacted company] Team

Look familiar? It should. It’s almost exactly the same message I got two weeks ago. It’s even purportedly from the same person.

One thing is obvious to me. The support system of this major software vendor is broken — possibly because it’s hosted in India where the people sitting at keyboards don’t understand English. They might consider getting some English-as-a-FIRST-language support staff to help their English-speaking customers.

Cutting Off Their Noses to Spite Their Faces

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I still can’t understand it.

The other day, one of my editors told me that the book I’m currently writing will be laid out in India. As a matter of fact, last year’s edition of the same book was also laid out in India.

She went on to tell me that the production department for the company had been downsized from 168 people to less than 20, with the majority of those jobs going to India.

What followed was a discussion of what the company could possibly be saving by making such a change. Sure, the Indian workforce is probably making a lot less per hour. And there’s a huge reduction in other payroll costs for things like vacation pay and health care and employer taxes.

But don’t they consider the cost to the U.S. Economy of putting 148+ people out of work? People who may not get jobs? People who may contribute to the home mortgage crisis by failing to pay their mortgages? Who may need to burden the country by requiring economic assistance to live and get healthcare? People who are a lot less likely to spend disposable income on things like books simply because they don’t have disposable income?

148 people, you say. That’s nothing. How is that going to affect the U.S. economy?

Well, it’s not just one company shipping jobs overseas. It’s hundreds or thousands of them. That equates to thousands of people out of work, many of whom may become unable to afford the goods or services offered by the companies that let them go.

How ironic. By acting in such an idiotic, short-sighted way, these companies are actually reducing their customer base. So while their costs are lower, their sales are likely to be lower, too. Net effect? Zero change in the bottom line!

When I was a kid, we called that “cutting off your nose to spite your face.” Wikipedia has this to say about this particular phrase: “Cutting off the nose to spite the face is an expression used to describe a needlessly self-destructive overreaction to a problem.” Although it usually refers to an act of revenge, I think it could apply to this situation, too.

How can companies reduce their bottom line without shipping jobs overseas? It’s pretty simple: use freelancers.

One of my other publishers has a very small in-house production staff. But it also utilizes a number of freelance production people all over the U.S. When the in-house staff is busy putting books together, it turns to its freelancers and assigns books to them. They get the job done right in a timely manner. They have to — if they don’t do the job satisfactorily, there’s another freelancer waiting in line behind them to do that job or the next one.

Freelancers might get a higher wage than in-house people, and they surely get a higher hourly wage than overseas workers, but they only get paid when they work. So you’re not paying them to hang around the office during slow spells, when there’s no work to do. And, if you pay by the job, rather than by the hour, you only pay for the work done — not time hanging around the water cooler or spending a few extra minutes at lunch.

Employers don’t have to pay taxes for contract labor like freelancers. They also don’t have to offer benefits like vacation time or healthcare. There’s no need to send them for training or to maintain a big human resources department to keep track of them.

And since many freelancers work from their homes, they’re not commuting to and from work. That means they don’t contribute to traffic, pollution, or greenhouse gases.

And since they do work and they do get paid, they have disposable income to buy consumer goods and services. (I’ve been freelance for 18 years now and I can assure you that I’m quite a consumer of goods.)

So my question is this: why don’t more companies explore the possibilities of using freelancers instead of shipping jobs overseas?

Comments? Use the Comments link or form for this post to share your thoughts.

Mango Chutney

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One of my favorite condiments.

Up until about 15 years ago, the only time in my life I’d ever had chutney was back in my college days. I was dating a guy with rich parents and they ate well. Sometimes, if we were lucky, we’d get to go with them. There was an Indian restaurant right off Second Avenue in the Sixties — my brain is saying 62nd Street, but I really can’t be sure. That was my introduction to Indian food, including curry, tandoori, poori, and mango chutney.

I liked what I ate. (That is the story of my life, isn’t it?)

Years ago, I ran across this recipe for mango chutney and figured I’d give it a try. It was easy enough to make and the pint yield held up remarkably well in my refrigerator. I mean really well. We were still eating it two years later with no sign of it going bad. I guess it’s the vinegar.

What’s this good on? My favorite is pork tenderloin. You grill up the tenderloins whole, then slice them into 3/4-inch medallions. Spoon on a little chutney and let the hot pork and cold tanginess of the chutney roll around in your mouth a bit before you swallow. Heaven. Good with a salad that has some kind of mildly sweet dressing, like a raspberry vinaigrette or honey mustard.

Here’s the mango chutney recipe:

Ingredients:

  • 1 pound mango, coarsely chopped. I use the frozen cubed mango and chop each cube into 4 or 6 pieces. It sure beats peeling and slicing fresh mango and I bet no one can tell the difference when it’s done.
  • 1 cup golden raisins. You can use the regular kind if you can’t find goldens.
  • 1 cup packed brown sugar. This is an excellent recipe for using up brown sugar that has solidified in an improperly closed bag. But fresh brown sugar won’t hurt it.
  • 3/4 cup vinegar. I use white vinegar.
  • 1 jar (2-7/8 ounces) crystallized ginger, finely chopped. I don’t know what kind of jarred ginger they’re talking about. Here on the edge of nowhere, I can get crystallized ginger in a little 3-oz bag. Close enough.
  • 1 clove garlic, chopped. I chop it really fine.
  • 1 teaspoon salt. I probably put a little less than that.

Instructions:
Place all ingredients in a sauce pan and heat to boiling. Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for about 45 minutes or until slightly thickened. Remove from heat, cool. Place in a sealed container — a canning jar works well for this; I avoid plastic for anything I want to keep long term — and store in refrigerator. Serve with pork (as discussed above) or Indian curry dishes.

I should probably mention somewhere that this doesn’t really smell very good while it’s cooking. After all, you are cooking vinegar. Not worth leaving the house for, but certainly not something you’d cook up when you’re trying to fill the house with nice aromas.

If you try this recipe and like it, please do let me know. Also let me know what else it’s good with. The only reason it lasts so long here is that I only eat it with pork — and I’m the only one in the house who does!

On College Reunions

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Apathy and death among Hofstra University’s Class of 1982.

Yesterday’s mail brought a big white envelope from Hofstra University, my alma mater. May 20 was the 25th anniversary of my graduating class, the Class of 1982. Although I was tempted to make the cross-country trek to Long Island, NY from my home in Arizona, I’d scheduled a helicopter rides gig for May 19 in Yarnell and preferred to do that. I’m glad I did.

A few months before the event, Hofstra’s Alumni Association sent out a survey form requesting bios from class members. Proud of what I’ve done since my college years, I promptly filled mine out and returned it to the school. They wanted a digital photo to go with it, but I forgot to go online (as they requested) and upload a suitable image.

My College Years

Understand this: my college years were among the most difficult yet enjoyable years of my life. Difficult primarily because of the expense. Hofstra, a private school, was getting about $120 per credit in those days. While I know that’s nothing compared to today’s tuitions, that $1800 to $2200 per semester tuition bill (plus books plus room and board) was killing me. The deal I cut with my parents was that each of them (they were divorced) would cough up 1/3 and I’d put in the final third. I consider myself lucky for being able to get that much from them. I also consider myself lucky for getting two scholarships that knocked more than $1000 off the annual tuition fee. So yes — I only had to come up with about $1200 a year. But I had to work two part-time minimum wage jobs (at less than $3/hour, if I recall) to make that and the money I needed to keep my car running and food in my mouth. I was 20 when I graduated and, by that point, I’d already worked harder than anyone else I knew.

(I was also incredibly thin at one point, weighing in at only 105 pounds. I ate little and worked hard and simply couldn’t keep the weight on. At 5’8″ tall, I looked terrible — absolutely skeletal. It took the school’s meal plan and those delicious hot rolls at dinner to fatten me back up.)

I’m not complaining about the hard work or financial situation. I believe in working hard to get ahead. And 25 years later, I still believe it. Too many people are looking for a free ride. Too many people spend more effort trying to get away with as little real work as possible than actually doing the work they’re being paid to do. And then they wonder why they’re not getting anywhere in life, why the promotions are always going to someone else, or why they’re first in line for layoff when their company starts sending jobs to India and Pakistan.

I also think that everyone should be a little needy at least once in their life. Back in those days, having $20 in my pocket made me rich. The money I made went to my tuition bill, to feed myself (until I got on that meal plan and my parents picked up 2/3 the cost), and to put gas in my car. (I drove a 1970 VW bug and gas cost 70¢ per gallon.) Most of my friends were in a similar situation, although I think I was the only one footing part of the bill for my education. We learned how far you could stretch a dollar and how important it was not to waste money on things we didn’t really need. I think that’s a lesson many of today’s kids could learn from. When you have to earn every dollar you spend, that dollar becomes a lot more valuable.

As for my college years being the most enjoyable of my life — well, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it’s mostly true. It gave me my first taste of real freedom — and real responsibility. I learned how to have fun and take care of the things I had to do to stay in school, get decent grades, and earn enough money to get by. I had a lot of friends — mostly people like me. I never joined a sorority, but I did become part of the yearbook staff as a photographer. I spent my off-hours during the day in the school’s game room, shooting pool with some friends and becoming a reasonably good pinball player. In the evening, we’d head over to a local bar, which had excellent french onion soup for just a buck and cheap beer on Thursday nights. We also hit the Ambassador Diner in Hempstead periodically for greasy but excellent batter dipped onion rings. Almost all of my friends were guys, but there was no sex between us. (I’ve always been “one of the guys” and I still am.) I dated two different guys while in college and, unlike so many of the girls at Hofstra for their “MRS” degree, wound up single when I graduated at the age of 20 with a BBA in accounting. That was fine with me.

Affection for My Alma Matter? I Don’t Think So.

I never really felt any affection for Hofstra. It seemed like every time I turned around, they had their hands out for money. I nearly got kicked out for late payment of tuition twice, yet they never failed to send requests for donations to my family. I get those requests now. They come to my house with full-color booklets about the newest on campus building and latest event, along with a summary of what the entire alumni student body has been up to — well, at least those members who bothered to provide updates. I used to provide updates once in a while, announcing a new book or providing information about my latest endeavor. They even featured my helicopter charter business in one issue. But the way I saw it, I struggled enough to pay them when I was a student and they never cut me any slack when I had trouble coming up with the dough. I didn’t owe them a thing.

I’m Not the Only One Who Doesn’t Care. But at Least I’m Still Breathing.

But when the reunion material arrived, I decided to fill it out and return it. I was curious about my classmates, curious about what they’d been up to all these years. I even toyed with the idea of blowing off my helicopter gig and going out for the reunion.

But when the reunion materials arrived today, I was glad I’d made the decision I’d made. Accompanying the “sorry we missed you” letter and donation request form was a thin booklet titled, Congratulations to the Class of 1982 on your 25th Anniversary. In it were photos as “bios” from 59 students (including me). I’d known two of them well — one of them is my step cousin. The photos were right out of the yearbook, with current photos added for the folks who had bothered to send them. Few had. Most bios lacked any amount of imagination, simply stating what degree the person had earned during his stay at Hofstra and whether he had gone on to earn additional degrees. Marriages to college sweethearts were mentioned more than a few times. Women were sure to mention how many kids they had. It was pretty boring stuff; only about 5 people wrote bios that actually brought readers up to date. (I was one of them, as you probably guessed.)

What was more tragic was the “In Memoriam” page after the bios. It listed 54 classmates that are no longer walking on this earth. 54! Sheesh! Almost as many dead ones as ones who bothered to respond to the reunion notice. And remember, this is a 25-year anniversary — not a 50-year. Most of my classmates are under 50. That means that at 54 of them died before their 50th birthday.

Now I don’t know how many people were in the class of 1982. I know that the School of Business, which was my slot at the graduation ceremonies, had hundreds of students in it. There had to be at least 2,000 students in the entire class. And the alumni association got reunion responses for just 113 of them — 54 of which were dead. Can you say apathy? And I thought I was alone in my feelings — or lack thereof — for the school.

And how many people actually showed up for the May 20 party? I hope they didn’t rent a big hall.