"Don't any of you $#$% people speak English??"

[Red Briggs]

Well, okay, I'm always saying that I'm not racist, I just hate everyone equally. And that's just the years of being a CSR talking. I have lovely stories about alot of people pulling the "race card". But those are stories for another time.

For now, let it be known, I am all for multiculturalism, in fact, living in Canada, having the views that I have, and my experiences growing up, I fully support it. Everybody is from somewhere else. We all imigrated from the Cradle of Civilization thousands of years ago.

My first job was working for this really great Chinese family who own a local western/chinese cuisine restaruant in my hometown. Honestly, I never felt so welcome. They were the nicest people you would ever meet in your life. It didn't even feel like a job. We had lots of fun. The owner, George (names changed obviously) had a good handle and his accent was still there. He actually admited his English wasn't the greatest, and that he needed help sometimes. Same thing with Jane, his wife, only her English was very good. Their daughters, were born in Canada, spoke both languages perfectly. The younger one actually spoke French too. That was cool. So, I tend to give a little bit of leeway on the whole speak my damned language issue cause a good deal of them are actually trying. Having learnt a second language, French people would laugh @ me for my poor skills. So, it's hard. But I wouldn't get a job @ a call center in France that's for sure. Enough to get by for a visit, but not to live there.

You come from a far away country. I support that. We all did. (French/Scottish Decent.) You wear different clothes and believe different things than I. Cool. I'm interested. You wanted to come to Canada to make a better life for your family. Hey, who doesn't? English is not your first language. Okay....... We'll work on that, but you need to communicate and speak the common language to get by, right? You wanna work in a profession that requires you to talk to numerous people in a day? Better learn to get good @ speaking English and en-nun-ci-ate. I know it's hard, but practice makes perfect.

As for out sourcing, there are good qualified people in your own country who can fill these jobs. Build a call center or two in a province or state that needs jobs and fill them. People will work for what you pay. A kid flipping burgers @ the McDonalds gets paid more than I do to control half a million dollars of inventory. People will try the job and hate the pay, hate the responsibility. But then you get people like me. The work is shite, as is the pay, but my personality type gets off on the stuff I do in my job. I get satisfaction out of it and feel I am making a difference for the store and my co-workers.

[PharmTechPhantom]

In the pharmacy, I really enjoy helping older folks who either can't see or hear to well, or can't make heads or tails of their insurance. Those are the people that appreciate you so much that they bring you food on holidays.

I moved to Baltimore 8 months ago, but at my old store, we had an elderly woman who would bring us a cake every Thursday, and a whole mess of others who brought food on Christmas.

Anyway, back to the topic, I've found that my fellow pharmacy techs from other countries often have a hard time dealing with other foreigners because they're both forced to communicate in a language that is not their first. I usually try to help at that point.

[RogueThinker]

Empathetic accents

This might be a litte OT, but I think it relates.
You see, I'm really, almost preternaturally good with accents. I can pretty much understand any version of English I hear, so at work CWs always get me to help if they are having trouble understanding a customer.

The amusing flip side? Empathetic speech. You see, some people, myself included, automatically begin to use similar intonation, vocabulary and body language to the people we speak to. This manifests most recognizably as accents. This means that if a CW can't help someone with a thick Georgian/French/Pakistani accent, I take over and begin to "mimic" the accent. You've never seen so many weird looks as the Sikh gentleman gave me one day, being as I am cracker-born.

It's not put-on, or done for ridicule, but damn, telling the Georgians (in a think Georgian accent) that I was Canadian? I hate that.

[Andara Bledin]

Same with me, RogueThinker.

I used to work at Medieval Times long, long ago, and it was a struggle to not emulate the accents of whoever came up to my window.

On a related note, I once had a caller from Texas (I'm a southern Californian, with a pretty vanilla regional accent) and I nailed his accent in the first sentence. He spent five minutes confirming that I was not from and in fact had never been to his home town in Texas.

Back on topic, I am the go to person here when it comes to thick accents. I don't mind, really, but there are some cases where the individual in question really should consider a career that doesn't involve any form of purely verbal communication. My coworker insists that all requests for quote on parts come in by fax or email so that she has a written record of what she wants and doesn't have to waste time taking information over the phone. One of our worst-accented regular customers fights to try to get a quote over the phone every single time.

As for the outsourced call centers, I concur that it isn't the accent so much as the lack of fluency. I understand that the first line in any troubleshooting will be the guy reading from the pre-determined script to weed out the 80% of calls that have a simple fix. But I'm usually fairly knowledgable about my tech, and it is exceedingly difficult to get the person on the other end to even acknowledge that you've said something unless it's an answer they are expecting.

^-.-^

[felixxkatt]

When i worked at a call center people would always assume we were in India. even though i sound like a solid Buffalonian. BUUT.... the last thre times i have called my credit card company for anything i have spoken to people who are obviously Indian and who are very hard to understand. ON TOP OF WHICH they are required to "PLAY DUMB" and offer me the same plan i have turned down 700 times.
"BUT MISS, please youare not understanding that you will not be having to pay for any bills which you accrue when you are injured or disabilitied when you subscribe to this protection plan!"
me: "NO, thank you, now i was calling about changing my address..."
"Miss, if you sign up for our protecting plan today you will be able to go six months without paying if..."
me: FOR THE HUNDRETH TIME, NO. stop now. please i want to change my address!
"Miss, we have an unbelievable deal for you today about this fabulous new protection planning!"
me: AAAAAUGH!

both my credit card and my former internet provider moved their call centers to India. it makes me nuts, actually, because i know they are doing their job, on one hand but i am incredibly frustrated on the other with the language barrier and the complete inability to say "NO."

[Kiwi]

My three weeks at the call centre of doom had many callers asking if we were outsourced....we are... to canada...(we had to say "were just north of seattle" lies!) but people were very suspicious!

I always threatened my team lead that if I got a grumpy guts I was going to revert back to my New Zealand accent and make it as thick as possible to get them to hang up so the call ends.

[myswtghst]

We have a number of agents in my call center outside Chicago that have accents. People give them a hard time, which ticks me off.

My biggest problem is that I was an actress, and spent a good deal of time learning accents/dialects. I think this is why when I talk to someone with a great accent, I subconsciously tend to kind of "mirror" their speech. It's particularly bad with our techs down South, as I love Southern accents and can't help but let it slip out a little.

[Imogene]

Vaguely related to the thread topic. I got a caller today who was extremely (and I do mean EXTREMELY) lost. He was trying to get in touch with his loan officer, had no employee id, no exception reference #, in other words, he was a borrower, whereas in my department we only talk to processors and underwriters, and no one else. Anyway, this guy tells me my boss' extension, and mentions the guy he talked to "had a Hispanic-sounding name."
"Dave Davenport? That's Hispanic?" (no, that's not his name, but bonus points if you recognize the source of the name)
Huzzah, guy got off my phone, although he was angry that I couldn't direct him at the proper department to get his loan info.

[Killer Bees]

I had Indian/Pakistani person call me up on my work phone number asking if I was happy with my phone plan Everything goes through our head office in another state.

The connection was so bad and his accent so thick, I just said, "no thanks" and hung up. He never called back.

If companies are going to oursource stuff, the least they could do is make sure that anybody who rings you can actually speak proper English. From what I can see the back lash in the Western world to oursourcing is such that companies will be forced to take their business back.

I absolutely refuse to speak to anyone who rings me and who can't speak English.

[CrazedClerk]

When I called my own cell company, the first time I got an indian sounding person and hung up. I called back and got a non-indian, non-asian sounding person and felt better.

No offense to people from those backgrounds, but I'd been dealing with an indian/middle eastern guy that I know didn't understand what I was asking so I wanted to make sure I got to someone who did.

[ArenaBoy]

My karate instructor was from Lebanon, moved to Canada, then came to the States. His accent is thick. Granted you got to understand him after a few days of being under his tutelage but if he wanted to amuse himself he would purposely make his accent thicker to confuse someone. His grasp of English was great but when it came to writing I was left in charge of writing newsletters and small business things. I also had a Russian history professor who came straight out of Poland in the 80s. The 1st thing he said was that the first few days will be difficult understanding him due to his accent, and none of us had a problem with it. I also went to school with many a German and Brazilian exchange students. Had no problem understanding them.

[myswtghst]

When I worked as a valet, our manager and most of my fellow employees were Spanish-speakers, so I ended up doing a lot of the boss' paperwork, just so it was not full of misspellings and poor grammar. I realized later on that I probably shouldn't have been doing that--but it meant I got to sit in the air conditioned office with a drink, instead of standing outside in the summer sun in a maroon polo and black pants.

[TNT]

I also had a Russian history professor who came straight out of Poland in the 80s. The 1st thing he said was that the first few days will be difficult understanding him due to his accent, and none of us had a problem with it.

When I was in college in the late '70s, my Russian professor had an incredibly thick Russian accent. One of his favorite phrases was "Vat is dat vord you haf in ENGLISH for thees?!"

I'm thinking, "Dude, your family emigrated from Russia during WWII... that was 35 years ago... and you were about 5. What's with the 'Vat is dat vord?!' schtick?"

But he was a totally cool guy anyway, and one heck of a chess player.

[Cia]

Anybody remember Lawrence Welk? With his accent you would swear he was from Norway but he was from North Dakota.

[RogueThinker]

Accent or communication barrier?

I had a math teacher in high school who sounded like Kermit the Frog. Had a prof in university who sounded like the guy from the Nestea ads ("Some parts of Switzerland do have Nestea...*augh!*...but not here i particular"). I never missed either class, just 'cause it was so fun to listen to them speak.

The point? Accents are a different issue from communication barriers. If you can't understand someone, whether their accent is unfamiliar or they have a speech impediment or speak too quickly, then I think either requesting someone else or hanging up (politely) and trying again are perfectly acceptable, since it isn't like the other person is having any success with the conversation either.

But immediately hanging up when you hear an accent or assuming the person is in some outsourced call centre, just from that one brief "Help, how can I help you?" is a bit premature, I think.