Saturday, September 13, 2008

Quality of Service provided by the Service Providers

I remember hearing an episode from my Master about quality of work done by people from India. Many years back in the British newspapers Churchill’s remark about loose wires hanging on the wall attributed to 'some indian must have done the electrical wiring' had attracted furore from Indian elite of his time. But after narrating this episode my master said “Churchill’s observation was correct. How much True it is?.” He went on to explain that we never take 'pride' in what we do.

It is quite sad that even after lapse of 50-60 years situation is very much similar. Although India has emerged as a hub of 'call centre' for the world and MNCs like Dell and others outsource their work to India - looking at quality of services offered - I'm convinced that this boom also will die the death of 'dot-com' bubble. It may not be that fast or sudden but it is written on the wall. Companies giving this outsourcing work to India will realize soon that it's not worth the saving. They better have few people on the job giving quality service than to give it out to Indian who has no concept of what service is.

This comments many seem too harsh but you can prove to yourself that it's 100% true. Just try calling any private or MNC bank in India; or any telephone company for some help; or any good insurance company. I've personally tried taking help on simple issues from ICICI Bank, CitiBank, ICICI Prudential Insurance, SBI Credit Cards, SBI online banking, BPL Mobile for Blackberry Services, Dell for Sales and Technical support, Principal of the D J Sanghvi Engineering College in Mumbai and story is alarmingly same. If you don't bang your head and/or phone and feel like pulling your hair and start curing your decision to take help from this service providers.

Believe me, Indian Government is not justified in charging us 12% Service Tax on Services that you get in India. Service tax should be on 'real services' and not on the 'harassment' in the name of service. May I suggest that Government should call it 'Harassment Tax' because in the name of service we get only a harassment.

I've to really make a great effort in remembering any incidence where I would have got a prompt, simple and correct answer from the service provider. Not that such incidents have not happened ever but they too miniscule in number (say 0.5%) .

You may reason saying I may be too demanding and that's why I'm feeling what I'm feeling. But that's not true. In fact, I'm surprised by the wondering that if I'm - a well educated - tech savvy person is getting such shabby answers from call centre employees and their supervisors; what an ordinary person on the road must be experiencing and feeling?

How is the salary that call centre executives and supervisors and manager is justified? Have you ever managed to speak to a call center's manager? I've never managed it. A call centre supervisor has got 100 tricks to ensure that you give up. Of course, I'm sure usage of such tricks would definitely lead to ulcer and/or heart attack. But, that's what they are getting paid for.

I wonder, what could be the remedy? When would we Indians start taking pride in the work that we do? When will we become disciplined? Even highly educated people are not free from these problems.

I think, it’s time that we stop accepting this non-sense without any fight. Time has come to assert our rights. It’s only we don’t tell that we ‘deserve’ better treatment that we get such treatment. Time has come when we start revolting. If we don’t – no body will.

We should stop saying that ‘who has the time’ to do all this? Agreed, most of us do not have time or energy to put this additional fights but some one will have to. If we don’t help ourselves who will help us? It’s time that we wake up to the fact that Government is not going to do anything unless we demand it forcefully. Courts are not going to help us unless we have infinite time and resources (money). Courts have ceased to a ‘pillar’ of democracy. Media is busy serving interests of ‘rich and powerful’. Who is going to serve us? No one, except ourselves.

Start hitting back whenever you are shabbily treated. Pick-up pen to write letters. Pick-up courage to speak up - without any fear. Demand and you shall get. Knock and door will be opened – Jesus said. It’s time that we take responsibility for ourselves in our own hands and stop depending upon Government, Courts and Media.

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