Customer service in India Rant

sisterpine · #1 05/10/05, 12:27 PM

What a frustrating experience! Nothing seems to be done in America anymore. Have problems with my Direcway Link I must speak to a CSR in India! Last night our Inverter/Charger took a deep dive and is not working. So...we have solar panels and wind inverter producing power that we cannot use. Forced to use gasoline (2.30 per gal) generator. Called Xantrex to speak to service tech to find out what I am to do (still under warranty). Waited on phone for 53 minutes! Finally got through to a tech whose name I could not understand. I asked and he too is in India! Proceeds to tell me nothing I dont already know and will not give me address to ship item for repair (costs 60 bucks to ship it) and says he wants me to check some wires before i ship and I should call him back!!!!! Like I am gonna call him again, NOT. Checked the wires and then sent an email to the head office of Xantrex asking them where to send the darn thing. Get an email back from the service department with a case number telling me their "target" for recontacting customers is 24 hours LOL. Can you tell I am a bit frustrated cause I cant vacuum? Can you tell I am a bit frustrated cause our compost toilet (Biolet- dont buy one) will not mix without power? Okay, now i feel better, gonna go outside, pick up stuff to take to dump. Should be fun since it is muddy as all heck and currently snowing again! This day has gotta get better! Kathleen

Little Quacker in OR · #2 05/10/05, 01:16 PM

And I thought I had problems!!! LOL That is really enough to make you mad! Rant all you want,we are there for you. Wish I were there to help.

This outsourcing thing is dispicable and I hate it!

Now you have made me feel guilty and I'll go out in the rain and get stuff loaded up for the dump on Saturday! LOL

LQ

Cyngbaeld · #3 05/10/05, 04:34 PM

Oh boy! Inverter problems, can I relate! LOL. Where did you buy it? Maybe they will have an idea of what you can do? I fried an inverter once with static electricity. Forgot to discharge to the wall before touching it. Expensive mistake.

southerngurl · #4 05/10/05, 04:45 PM

Yup, those csr's in India are no fun. Can't understand them, and they don't know squat usually, just looking up info on a computer program. :no:

fordy · #5 05/10/05, 05:20 PM

...........This is Exactly , the Very Reason that I won't buy a Dell computer , or anyother computer that outsources their Customer Service Line TOO some Elephant Jockey in Kat Man DO Do.....I bought from a local computer store and when I have a Bi__h I just drive into town and we both converse in English instead of Punjhab Piglatin ..Oh Itsha!! , fordy..

moopups · #6 05/10/05, 05:21 PM

There are some to gentle to live among wolves...

Stop being too gentle.....

Windy in Kansas · #7 05/10/05, 05:41 PM

Try this---apologize to the India tech or wherever they are from, and simply say, "I'm sorry, but where I live we have few people that speak with an accent. While you are speaking clearly I'm still having trouble understanding you. Can you put someone on the line that doesn't have an accent or give me a number in the US to call please?"

Works every time, they will give you a US tech number to call.

Dave · #8 05/10/05, 05:55 PM

To be fair Windy, everyone has an accent. Even people in KS do to those who don't live there. I was told that often when I moved from KS to PA(and they sounded "funny" to me too)

I rarely have a need to call a customer service line but I've never had a problem understanding the reps in India although I may have to listen more carefully than usual. As long as consumers keep demanding low prices over everything else, I'd expect the trend to continue.

antiquestuff · #9 05/10/05, 06:22 PM

While people in diff. parts of this country may sound strange to each other, usually they can understand each other--sometimes you can not even make out any words some foreign customer service reps. say. Not to be mean to them, but, we need to be able to easily understand a service rep.

edcopp · #10 05/10/05, 07:38 PM

Always keep a spare broom in the old (but still works) outhouse.

southerngurl · #11 05/10/05, 07:46 PM

Quote:

To be fair Windy, everyone has an accent. Even people in KS do to those who don't live there. I was told that often when I moved from KS to PA(and they sounded "funny" to me too)

But these people in India have a STRONG accent. Very thick.

cruiser3006 · #12 05/10/05, 07:59 PM

Just to agitate a little more!
Besides your inverters and electronics, most of nortel, verizon, tax services and other corporations have outsourced record/data keeping and tech services to India and a couple of other places. Another software company is going to place a cruise ship off the coast of calif to house 300?? India and china employees, so they don't have to pay taxes, ins etc. These are India and chinese citizens, not U.S. and they will be paid a lot less than standard wages. Just one more way to make americans dependent on other countries and make us poorer.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/arti...TML&u=19496917

Some local independent shops, sometimes have a person that is willing to try to fix an item that isn't too seriously damaged. (or they might know someone)

Caelma · #13 05/10/05, 08:11 PM

AOL and other compaines are like this also.
I can never understand tech support or cust serv
cause they have strong accents.
AOL AMERICA on line
Not INDIA on line.
Its very frustrating to deal with a company who
has foreign emplyees with accents.

texican · #14 05/10/05, 10:10 PM

dear sisterpine

also have direcway...I do not call customer service...I have learned every troubleshooting trick imaginable to keep my system up and running...

on your inverter woes, my sympathies...been there... Back when I was 100% solar, I always kept a couple of the 'throwaway' inverters for emergencies... If you're living off the grid, you're already used to being your own power company...if something goes wrong, you just about have to be able to troubleshoot the problem and fix it yourself...unfortunately, unless you're an electrical engineer with a soldering iron, and cases of spare diodes, transistors, etc., there's nothing you can fix on an electrical item like inverters...all you can do is replace em or send em back...and I'd much rather go online and find out how to send it back... Just went to google for Xantrex, and two clicks later had info on getting a RMA for returning...............of course, if you can't get online cause your inverter wont work, you got troubles....that's when the local library's internet connections come in handy...

good luck with your direcway...have you 'engineered' your system to work straight off your DC without having to go through an inverter???

phil

pcwerk · #15 05/10/05, 10:52 PM

I assume all you folks don't shop at Walmart either? Thats just the "American
Way" now...outsource all of our jobs! (At least after all these years of outsourcing blue-collar jobs, now they are finally getting around to white-collar
jobs!) If you don't agree with all this bs call your representative and tell them
to vote against CAFTA (Central America Free Trade Agreement). A good book
on how all this crap started is "The Selling of Free Trade: NAFTA, Washington,
and the Subversion of American Democracy" by John R. MacArthur. That ol'
"liberal" Clinton and all his Republican cronies sold us down the river with that one! Geez, give me a break...
james in houston

ps
I am moving to a place (Spring Grove, MN) where the local hardware store has
been in the same location for 100 years! It feels ---- good to shop there.

Siryet · #16 05/10/05, 11:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pcwerk

I assume all you folks don't shop at Walmart either? Thats just the "American
Way" now...outsource all of our jobs! (At least after all these years of outsourcing blue-collar jobs, now they are finally getting around to white-collar
jobs!) If you don't agree with all this bs call your representative and tell them
to vote against CAFTA (Central America Free Trade Agreement). A good book
on how all this crap started is "The Selling of Free Trade: NAFTA, Washington,
and the Subversion of American Democracy" by John R. MacArthur. That ol'
"liberal" Clinton and all his Republican cronies sold us down the river with that one! Geez, give me a break...
james in houston

ps
I am moving to a place (Spring Grove, MN) where the local hardware store has
been in the same location for 100 years! It feels ---- good to shop there.

You mean to tell us you will be able to go to a store that has been in the same place fer moren a year/ Well, that's just unHoston Like. Ya must be a trader.

We moved and the population of our small town is the same as last week. Wife and I were shocked to say the least since the population of Houston used to change by the second. LOL Houston in my rearview mirror and never looked back.

jrw422 · #17 05/10/05, 11:42 PM

Add another one to the list. Sprint now has "out sourced" CS. So frustrated I hung up after 30 mins of trying to get a problem solved. I will be glad when I get out of the rat race. I am fast tracking toward that goal!!

sisterpine · #18 05/11/05, 12:18 AM

LOL wow you folks really made me feel better! Emptied the old change jar and went and bought a cheapy inverter, it is smaller but will allow for the minimal power we need to keep the comode mixing and the lamps when we want to read! Shipped off the pricey one to repair in Oregon after talking to a very nice american business owner who is authorized to do warranty work.

Also, it took me a while to work up some courage but I did manage to call Xantrex back and insist on speaking to someone I could understand. Got shifted around to a woman in Washington state and was much easier to deal with this way!

I was in Calgary Canada last week (selling my wares) and went to buy a few "stayed home" gifts. Everything that said Canada on it was made in China! LOL what a bunch of bologna all this free trade is becoming...

Quint · #19 05/11/05, 04:19 AM

For some of these things I have found it is better to call during normal business hours. A couple of places I deal with outsource their night shifts to India or wherever.

The whole thing makes my blood boil and I've went elsewhere with business to get away from having to deal with foreigners on the phone. I deal with one place near an urban center on the east coast and it has so many people that can't speak English I have to redial 8 or 10 times to get an actual American on the phone. If I didn't need the company I'd ditch them.

I'm a well traveled hillbilly. I've been all over the world but when I am home I want to hear English and I don't care to try to decipher a foreign accent. I spent ---- near 10 minutes trying to give my address to someone New Delhi who couldn't speak English and could not get how the term "rural route" fit into an address and screwed it up so bad you wouldn't believe it. My mailman thought the story was hilarious. It ended up being spelled "rhuaal ruhgt". I SPELLED IT TO HIM and he STILL couldn't understand.

GRRRRRRRRR. I better top or I'll go on a 2000 word, 4 am, let 'er fly, you tell 'em Quint venom spitting rant. Ugh. And I actually have to call someplace tomorrow with customer service in India. I'd pay 10 bucks to call and hear an American at the other end. Oh to hear a pleasing southern accent on the other end! That would be wonderful. A cheery Minnesotan or even a New Yorker on the other end would be fine as well. I'd gladly accept a Canadian for that matter. I just don't wanna deal with an ESL dropout from Bombay. The world just sux nowadays.

mikell · #20 05/11/05, 05:55 AM

The state of Michigan had their telephone information services in India. Within a few months of people from Michigan trying to get information on Michigan state departments from India with no luck and lots of complaints the plug was pulled and we went back to the old way. You now make a call to the phone number listed in the phone book under MI government you get a computer that keeps asking questions that take you deeper into the bottomless pit where you either get hung up on or magically back to the main menu.Never can you actually talk to someone.

mikell