Free Republic

Sept. 28, 2005 — As Hurricane Rita roared toward them, more than 300 people called the local emergency number broadcast all around Nacogdoches County in east Texas. What they didn't know was that the operators on the other end of the phone were 7,000 miles away in India. With power down and limited means of communication, Nacogdoches County Judge Sue Kennedy, who acts as the emergency coordinator, decided to set up a phone bank to help people out. She called a local firm that runs call centers and asked if they could help the community. Effective Teleservices, based in Nacogdoches,...

Call center professionals in India are well taken care of by the employers, compared to the US, where the workers were treated as a "commodity", said an official of the Communication Workers of America (CWA), the largest workers union in the US. "The call center environment in India is much better. In the US, the employers are not considerate about the workers. They treat people as a commodity," Steve Tirza, President, CWA, who was here along with other members to have a first-hand understanding of the call center and IT industry in India, told PTI. Taking exception to the argument...

NEW DELHI - There is more than one reason US President George W Bush should thank Indians, whether in the United States or India, as the buildup to elections in the US slated for November gathers steam. Indians are contributing handsomely to Bush's campaign funds while, until recently, there was a band of more than 100 dedicated call-center executives who were handling Bush's fundraising and vote-seeking campaign for the Republican Party from the outsourcing hubs of Noida and Gurgaon, which adjoin the national capital Delhi.

Capital One has cancelled a deal with India's largest call centre after it emerged that Indian workers had misled the US credit card company's customers with unauthorised offers of credit. Wipro Spectramind, the Indian technology company, discovered the offers in a routine inspection and disclosed the evidence to Capital One, which decided "not to renew" its telemarketing contract with the New Delhi-based call centre. The US card issuer declined to comment further yesterday, but its decision comes as a wider political backlash against the outsourcing of such work overseas threatens to undermine the sector's dramatic growth. Politicians in Washington are...