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Listen to the podcast: Outsourcing Tech
Support - Good, or Evil?. 
Transcript
If you call the tech support lines for many major companies these days, you can't really be sure that the person you're talking to isn't a few miles away or on the other side of the planet. We've all heard of technical supporting being outsourced to overseas companies, often in India, to reduce costs. The current state of technology allows us to communicate anywhere on the planet cheaply and instantaneously, so it does make a certain amount of sense that, all else being equal, companies would be foolish not to consider it.
But is it evil? Many think so.
I don't.
What I believe that most people actually find evil isn't where their tech support representatives might be located ... it's the quality of that tech support. They may believe that they're seeing a lower level of expertise when they can detect that the call has been routed off shore, and it's certainly possible that that's the case. But it's not the location that's the problem - it's the incompetence.
And incompetence knows no geographical boundaries.
I truly and honestly don't care if the person I'm speaking to on the phone is in my neighborhood, my country, or half way around the planet, as long as they can help me. That, typically, can be summed up in two measures: can we communicate, and do they know what they're talking about?
You don't have to be overseas to blow it. I've nearly hung up the phone on U.S.-based support reps because their regional accent was so thick that I could barely understand them. I left my former ISP because their technical support staff was incompetent and could only follow the script that they had been given.
I would have been quite happy in both cases if I could understand them, and if they could actually help me - even if they'd been overseas.
My bottom line? Don't blame overseas outsourcing, per se, it's part of what's keeping your costs down - but do hold companies accountable for the quality of their service, regardless of where it's coming from.
I'd love to hear what you think. Visit askleo.info, and enter 9653 in the go to article number box. Leave a comment, I read them all. And while you're there: sign up for my free weekly newsletter.
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Article C2510 - January 4, 2006
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
Wow... a lot of really interesting (and mixed!) views on outsourcing, years after the original post.
Leo I think you're spot on. Outsourcing is often assumed to mean "offshoring", where many companies can benefti from "onshoring" their outsourced services.
From an Australian perspective, much of our tech support is also sent offshore by the 'big boys' (not so much by the smaller players, in my experience). However, this is really not smiled upon these days - and "offshoring" in some circles is a bit of a taboo topic!
In reality, an inadequately trained person in India or China is just as inadequate if they are sitting in the same office as me. However perception is everything. I know many Australians who will hang up if they hear a long delay between the phone ringing and the answering of the phone; knowing it's going overseas.
I also believe culture plays a huge part in tech support; an Australian using "Aussie slang" with someone in India or China, usually results in silence on the other end of the line.
Truth is, for technical support - outsourced or in-house - the best solutions come from conversations, not scripts.
Evil? No. Good? Depends on MANY factors :)
Take care.
Glen Parker
Posted by: Glen at February 21, 2010 10:03 PMSydney, Australia
OmniSupport.com
Outsourcing per se as the article states isn't evil. However if you can't understand the person or the person competence level isn't up to par then forcing your customers to indulge this lack of customer support is evil. Customer support in most companies now adays seems to be an after thought and that's a real shame.
Posted by: Anthony at March 10, 2010 5:45 AMThe fact that it's evil has nothing to do with the poor quality of service. It has to do with job competition.
People trained in America, living in America, paying American costs for goods get completely screwed by having to compete with someone else (less qualified, though that's not the point at all) who is willing to work for less-than-American wages.
Outsourcing is a huge part of the cause of our current economic problem. Too many people are jobless. This means way less spending. And with the social burden growing, the middle class gets to shoulder an even greater tax load, pushing them into a state of taxed poverty, reducing their spending drastically.
Why should a company hire me (very qualified) for the type of salary I need to survive when they can hire someone else (less qualified but still qualified enough to get the basic job done - (indians are known to be the worst programmers in the world, though bill gates released a statement saying the opposite to justify microsoft's excessive outsourcing)) who can work for a third as much, without any benefits?
There's no question that outsourcing is evil and greedy. It's also destructive and should be illegal.
It's pretty sad that you're focused on the customer side of things and not the massive unemployment and droves of Americans forced to work for pennies in jobs they are horrendously overqualified for.
Maybe try to grow up and take a look at the real world. This crisis isn't exaggerated. If anything it's downplayed. Outsourcing isn't the only cause or even necessarily the greatest cause of our problems, but it's definitely a major one.
Posted by: david bandel at March 24, 2010 11:47 AMThere are a lot of mixed reviews especially regarding keeping jobs in America. If you ever want to find an answer for anything just follow the money.
Us Americans want to have our cake and eat it to. We want cheap products and then get upset when the company reduces cost to provide those for us.
Does outsourcing reduce jobs for Americans? Maybe. Probably. However it's not the companies fault. Unlike Government they can't just make money they have to earn our money. If we want Technical Support to be in America then don't give money to companies that won't keep it here. The problem is American's have overwhelmingly chosen we would rather have a cheap product.
Posted by: Jay Shepherd at April 19, 2010 11:53 AMI come across the problem "Scripted Assistance" all the time and can never be helped with my problem. If it's a problem that can be fixed in the simplest way possible regardless of what damage is done, they go for it. Generally, both "Tech" and "Support" are outright jokes.
I have called for support at least 5 times in the past, and I have NEVER gotten a correct solution. The evil is these companies paying people to sit around copy-pasting responses.
Posted by: Tassy at November 14, 2011 12:44 AM