Press Statement: It's a Mistake to Overlook Overseas Outsourcing
IT’S A MISTAKE TO OVERLOOK OVERSEAS OUTSOURCING
As debate continues to rage with regards to overseas outsourcing, Sanjeev Patel, owner and managing director of CNG Business Services comments that, although the practice of using overseas call centres has received negative press, it is a mistake to completely overlook the services that these organisations can offer.
At CNG Business Services, we often hear people claim that overseas outsourcing is commercial suicide, simply because all people ever hear about are negative experiences. But, this is not the true picture. Overseas outsourcing can deliver cost savings of up to 60 per cent and tremendous efficiency improvements which directly impact the bottom line. Positive perception and results occur if businesses take the time to choose the right company to work with and the right services to outsource.
The complaint is that overseas call centre workers are too aggressive, don’t fully understand their products and have poor communication skills. Each of these misperceptions has been carefully considered by CNG Business Services and has been addressed from the outset.
A common problem that people associate with overseas outsourcing is language and in particular the accents of call centre workers based in India. At CNG Business Services we send our employees on courses to ensure that they all speak fluent English and that any heavy accents are softened to make it easier for our clients to understand and engage with our staff.
In addition, we also send our employees on a localisation course. This gives them an understanding of geographical locations throughout the UK and means that they are better able to relate to callers. The more knowledge we can provide our operatives with, the better equipped they are to deal with customers and the better service they are able to provide.
Not all outsourcing specialists will go to these lengths to ensure that the client experience is positive, however at CNG Business Services, we feel that it is important to promote best practice and encourage favourable feedback about overseas outsourcing.
Like many companies providing a range of services, there are some areas within a business that are better suited to overseas outsourcing than others. For example CNG Business Services would never recommend that a consumer facing luxury brand outsource a customer service department, after all people pay a premium to receive very personal and often local care from these brands.
However businesses that require support services twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, can benefit from overseas outsourcing. It makes sense for these companies to use a cost effective option that can reassure customers that they have a point of contact that will be available at any time of the day or night. The cost of providing 24 hour service from an overseas location might be the same as just a few hours of service in the UK. Customers understand that companies do not have infinite budgets and are willing to accept overseas outsourcing when it is explained to them the restricted alternative they could have for the same money in the UK.
If you think logically about a business and what services could and arguably should be outsourced, it becomes immediately apparent that significant cost savings can be achieved as a result of offshore support. Data capture, inputting, finances and back office support are all services that can be handed to an offshore outsourcing team with no negative impact on the business. There is no need for these processes to happen in the UK, even by a domestic outsourcing provider. Many international corporations utilise such services or even have their own dedicated overseas offices purely for such functions, and because these are not customer facing, no one even pays this a second thought.
Technical support and IT services are just two examples of outsourcing frequently carried out overseas. Technically skilled people are very expensive in the UK, and much, much cheaper overseas. They also frequently rely on scripted copy and frequently asked questions & answers making the process easy to transfer.
We work hard to ensure that we match a client’s service requirement with the most suited candidates from our team based in Mumbai. The reduced cost of overseas labour, which is still considerable by local standards, mean’s that we are able to pass significant savings back to our medium and large sized corporate clients in the UK, reducing their overhead costs and increasing efficiencies.
In particular during difficult economic times, businesses have had to downsize and in many instances make redundancies, leaving gaps within the skill set of their organisation. This is where we are able to help, as we can support the business function with administrative tasks, out of hours support, invoice processing, telemarketing and software development.
Then, once the business becomes more established and is in a position to rehire, we are also able to support with recruitment, providing the client with an end to end offering, as opposed to one-off services.
This is another example of how we differ to other overseas outsourcing companies. We want to develop ongoing relationships with clients, not one-off campaigns or services. We work hard to add value to the services we offer and to provide a professional and personal approach to all that we do.
It is very short sighted to perceive that all overseas outsourcing suppliers are unable to do the job properly. Companies should be searching for outsourcing suppliers that can support their business and allow them to compete more effectively within their markets, regardless of geographical location.
Another misconception is that the only service outsourcing companies provide is call centre operatives selling products to consumers, which simply isn’t true. We have highly skilled employees working within our offices who can provide professional services such as accountancy. There is no reason why UK based businesses have to rely entirely on UK based accountants. Inputting figures and arranging reports and accounts can be done anywhere in the world, with no customer involvement in the process.
Plus with the increasing take up of the residential telephone preference service (TPS), business to consumer telesales is considerably restricted and as CNG Business Services follows UK law, this significantly reduces the number of calls that can possibly be made – therefore making it increasingly difficult to achieve clients’ sales targets. As a result we find that we do more business-to-business sales & support services, and less consumer-facing work.
With more and more businesses trading internationally, it makes commercial and financial sense to work with overseas outsourcing suppliers. The most important thing for a potential user of overseas business process outsourcing services is to be open to trying a different way to solve their business requirement. Speak with a selection of outsourcing companies and make a decision based on an objective view, price and confidence.
As with all services, businesses should ask for testimonials, case studies and referrals – CNG Business Services’ website demonstrates each of these. Properly planned outsourcing will result in reduced labour costs and increased efficiencies, allowing a company to focus on its core business competences.
Despite the fact that overseas outsourcing is often viewed negatively, some companies have been relying on the process for years and as a result are able to save money and do what they do best – focus on the customer and developing their business.
The best advice we can offer is to be choosy about who you work with and to put reasonable and realistic targets in place. Only then will businesses start to realise that working together with overseas outsourcing companies can lead to long term relationships that can have a very positive impact on bottom-line performance.
For further details about CNG Business Services please contact Sanjeev Patel on tel. 01904 692447. // ENDS
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