RP call centers reel from world’s highest turnover
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By AURELIO A. PENA | Davao Today
DAVAO CITY — Like zombies, they stumbled out of the elevator: haggard, red-eyed, and sleepy in shabby, crumpled clothes and disheveled hair. Some in sandals and pajamas, their hands gripping either a big coffee mug or a water bottle, they chatter away in English.
This is a typical early morning scene in one of the Philippines’ biggest call center firms along Ayala Avenue in Makati City after a graveyard shift that starts at 10 p.m. and ends at 6 a.m.
Despite efforts by the country’s call center companies to glamorize the industry, call center agents are resigning, job-hopping, transferring or being fired by the hundreds as fast as they are being hired. That image of a “successful call center executive making it in the business world” is lost to these call center agents who are just too glad to quit the industry.
Turnover rate in the country’s call centers has gotten so worse that it has hit 60 to 80 percent, according to the Call Center Association of the Philippines (CCAP). This has given the Philippines the world’s highest turnover rate for call centers worldwide.
Globally, it is an accepted norm in the industry to have a 30 to 40 per cent turnover. Both Australia and India call centers have turnover rates of only six to 10 percent. Top government officials are alarmed that an emerging industry that has generated around 2 billion US dollars in annual revenues is reeling from a worsening turnover crisis.
“It’s like a zoo factory over there and we’re the new blue collar workers,” says Rommel Benitez, 32, who quit his call center job last week, his eyes still bulging from dark eyebags, from lack of sleep. “You can’t relax, we’re always in a hurry. We’re always being watched.
Coffee break is barely 15 minutes and our lunch at midnight is under time pressure that we have a hard time swallowing our food.”
Catriona Wallace, researcher and industry analyst with the Journal of Service Industry Management said the high turnover oftentimes is the result of a “deliberate strategy of frequent employee replacement “to provide enthusiastic and highly motivated customer service at low cost to the call center.
“What you see here is an industry-wide policy of firing and replacing employees to keep their workforce fresh and motivated.” Wallace said.
Industry analyst Ben Teehankee lambasted this policy among call center firms to keep changing their employees to keep them fresh and enthusiastic.” This strategy is not consistent with giving good jobs to Filipinos and developing people for higher job responsibilities,” says Teehankee, who chairs the Human Resource Management Department of La Salle School of Business in Manila.
Broken promises and misleading advertising by the country’s call centers were also blamed by call agents who quit or “requested to be fired” to avoid paying penalties for quitting too early. Many call center firms are still denying this is happening.
The nation’s big dailies are filled with full-page ads with screaming headlines like: “Are you getting paid for your performance ?” “Ride your future with us!” “Great careers happen overnight!” “Entrust your dreams with us!” “Earn as much as P40,000 a month!” “Get our P10,000 signing bonus!”
Most of the call centers which came out with these advertisements either ignored or neglected the promises they made, according to Marrisa Tiongko, 25, another call center agent who quit recently.
“I was promised 15,000 pesos monthly salary and another 5,000 pesos for food and transport allowance during training—- but I got only 11,500 monthly with no training allowance. They lied. It wasn’t worth it,” says Tiongko, a masscom graduate from Legaspi City
Most call canter agents, after they passed a two-week training, usually get only 11,500 to 13,000 monthly plus benefits like SSS coverage, health insurance, housing plan,etc—– which are deducted from the agent’s salary every month. This is equivalent to less than 300 US dollars monthly in the Philippines, a far-cry from the US call center agent average salary of 2,500 US dollars monthly.
Many American call center companies made the Philippines their favorite choice for investments in business process outsourcing (BPO) precisely due to cheap labor from abundant, highly-skilled English-speaking Filipinos,” quips a human resource manager of People Support, Inc.
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March 15th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
It never surprises me that call center proprietors just can’t seem to get it through their brains that you can’t just treat your employees as some expendable resource to abuse at will. Hence why I created my website http://www.convergyssucks.com.
March 15th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
call center agents are highly bankable in this country… often than not, most call center agents are too pressured with the 8-hours duty and gets home without extra baggages… i know a lot of call center agents, they are the ones who are adding more stress to their daily routine, overspending on vices, drugs and other stuff… poor attitude makes them more stressed. call centers offer big amount of salaries and benefits, a LOT of agents doesn’t know how to manage it…
March 17th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
At Convergys, only 3 to 5 out of every 20 trainees survive an intensive one-month training. That is tantamount to a 15-25% Graduation Rate… how is that possible? According to my friend who is a Training in Convergys, their Graduation Rate is averaging somewhere between 85-95%. I wonder where you got your data?
Because if 15-17 Trainees fail for every group of 20.. factor in the cost of training (between US$700-1500) then Convergys should have folded up weeks ago instead of growing to 12,000 or so employees.
March 20th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
You’ve got to be an ex-Con or even an ex-trainee to know what’s happening at Convergys. But its the happiest times of their lives to be out of Convergys. They remember the “night of the massacre” when halfway thru their training course, still halfcooked and dazed, unable to absorb the nightly lectures that stretched to the wee hours of the morning, trainors suddenly barged in and announced a series of exams with 100% as passing grade— or perfect score. Trainees could hardly navigate a new software program for the jobs they were hired— but they’re forced to get the exams whether they like it or not. And they have to pass with a 100% perfect score. That’s how they do a “mass execution” at Convergys. (This is also happening in other call centers, we were told by trainors) Most often than not, you see a group of 20 trainees almost wiped out, with only 3 or 5 passing the training and getting the jobs. The promise of P5000 monthly training allowance for fares and meals was forgotten. The promise of P15,000 salary suddenly shrunk to P11,500. Hungry with empty pockets, they suddenly find themselves out of the company, but delightfully relieved and very happy. No, they can’t quit the training on their own, otherwise they’re penalized P25,000. So it’s better to be fired. And many, many others actually “asked to be fired” to avoid paying the penalty. Its nice to know that there’s a growing number of ex-Cons who put up their own website to get the feelings of hundreds of others who got out of Convergys— all happy that they’re out FREE AT LAST !
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:31 pm
i think that expectations were laid out before training actually starts. you’re complaining at how cvg is strict - well, it just goes that you guys don’t deserve to be in cvg at all if you can’t keep up to the standards that they have set. that’s how it is for majority of the call centers: they need to be strict as it is Client initiated. how can cvg be sure of quality service if their training department is very lax? so, i guess you we’re thinking that being an agent is easy. welcome to the real world!! being an agent is hard and you need to really strong to be able to survive. Bottom line is, SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST!!
April 3rd, 2008 at 5:59 pm
In my opinion, we are lucky that call centers invested their money here in Philippines. They provided fair salary and benefits. Try to work in other companies; they will just pay you basic salary and for how much? There are even no proper benefits. My friend worked in Dubai and earned 15,000 pesos and she was very far from her family. Did it compensate her? For those agents who complained how tiring call center is; here is what I can say dudes “It’s a matter of self-discipline and motivation”. The problem with us, we tend to complain without seeing the positive side yet. Some of my friends quit when we were still in the training because they couldn’t adjust the schedule but after two months they like to re-apply. Why? Is it because Filipinos are changeable minds? Of course not! The reasons are: We don’t know how to appreciate and we don’t want somebody will discipline us in other words; we hate rules and regulations and plus the pride!!! Come to think of it…
April 25th, 2008 at 8:49 am
Call center agents are treated like prisoners in a concentration camp, with “Nazi” security guards eyeing every employee like they are potential thieves or terrorists. Inside, its like a factory and the agents are seen as machines that must function as machines that run smoothly. Look at their faces, Look at their eyes when you’re in an elevator with them. Try to listen to them talk in whispers in the cafeteria when they’re tired of speaking English. Even their laughters and their smiles are fake and put-ons because they all badly need the money. Every agent knows they all work under the “sword of Democles” —- just three mistakes and you’re gone. You stop being a human being when you’re a call center agent. Talk to the hundreds who quit or asked to be fired, they’ll tell you the same story…
May 25th, 2008 at 2:51 am
I can’t believe the turn over rate.. !