Mention outsourced customer service and most people have a horror story. Usually, the frustration is an incomprehensible accent or repetition of the same scripted responses.
Many companies opened call centers in the US to avoid the public backlash against outsourced tech support. The problem is US-based call centers are much more expensive, which translates to enormous pressure for employees to keep the call times super low. You end up with a tech support team with high turnover and low morale.
Out of all the experiences I’ve personally had calling in to technical support providers for whatever has gone wrong with my computer at the time, only the first one went poorly. That was back when outsourcing of support services was in its infancy. Some of the best tech support I’ve encountered was outsourced support. Of course, if you are looking for phone support and sell your products in the US, your technical support providers must speak near-perfect English. Most technical support providers nowadays screen their employees for skilled English speakers.
The advantage of outsourced IT support is a larger percentage of people outside the US speak English to some degree. It’s rarer to see native English speakers from the US fluent in a second language. I’ve made customers for life because they discovered in a primarily English-speaking industry, I could assist in Spanish. Millions of people in the US do not have a strong command of English but have lots of purchasing power. It’s silly to leave that business on the table.
If you are worried about your inbound customer service outsourcing partner’s ability to provide your customers tech support in perfect English, there are two easy ways to test them. Get the names of some of their clients and look at their customer service reviews. Another is to simply call the tech support number for that company with a question. That conversation will tell you everything you need to know about their language capabilities.
The other important aspect to consider about 24/7 outsourced tech support is do they have staff that can speak Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog, Vietnamese or French? Word travels quickly about companies who can accommodate their customers in their first languages. It’s that extra little amount of effort and attention to detail that will boost your company from great to excellent customer service.
Helpware offers comprehensive support for companies that outsource tech support with high flexibility and predictability of revenues and expenditure. If you are wondering why to outsource tech support, our experts are at your service for a consultation.