A six hour phone call to India

The BBQ Pit
21

[QUOTE=Nava]
I have been implementing SAP for the last 5 years. For those of you not familiar with this, it’s a program designed to help a company run its business in a “wholistic” way - meaning not glass pyramids, but you have your finance data and your warehouse data and your quality data and your labelling info all in the same huge database..
[/QUOTE]

Not to hijack, but budding SAP/ABAP developer here. Lemme just say that the pretty pastel-colored screen from a program dump is nice and all, but when the abend is in German, or when the client asks you to install OSS Note such and so, and the instructions are in German…

and I, not even having had the opportunity to take German…

… I’m very happy that Babelfish gives me some kind of translation to go on, even if it is - shall we say? - interestingly put together.

Encountering language differences in situations like these are difficult at best and downright frustrating the rest of the time. Thank goodness for e-mail and free translators. :slight_smile:

22

[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman]
Indians are getting a lot of bad press lately.
[/QUOTE]

IMHO, it’s because of two things.

In a previous thread, I shared how I sometimes get email messages asking, in so many words,“You will kindly tell me everything about town planning in NMorth America please” - questions qwith such a broad scope, it would be impossible to answer them in less than a few hundred pages. ALL of those emails come from India. ALL of them. After hashing itout, the verdict seemed to be the Indian educational system; independent thinking and problem solving is far mess important than rote memorization.

Whenever I called a tech support line in the US, the person on the other end often based their questions on a hunch about what was wrong, based on similar problems they might have heard about with previous customers they helped. With the Indian tech support crew, it’s all scripted. Help wizards have never given me any useful answers whenever I had aproblem with my computer, and I don’t expect better results when Sanjit descends through a script. They can’t figure out on their own what’s wrong, unless it falls neatly in the scenarios scripts are intended to solve; loose video cards, DNS server settings, and the like.

Secondly, Americans have a VERY difficult time understanding Indian accents. The sing-songiness and lack of syllable stress is very alien to American ears; it’s unlike the regional North American and BBC English accents we’re accoustomed to. I’ve also encountered a lot of Indian English. “Kindly tell me what the problem is,” for instance, which Americans will interpret as “I assume you’re not a nice person, so don’t be your usual mean self when you tell me what the problem is.” Indian English frequently uses the imperative case in making requests and asking questions, which an American will interpret as a blunt, rudely presented command.

Now, if I could get an IIT grad on the other end of the phone, all will be well. :slight_smile:

23

[QUOTE=spooje]
Yes, but often, and I do mean often, we ask the same question several times in several ways before the customer admits the truth.

[/QUOTE]
::emphatic agreement::

I’ve done some tech support work, and at my last job I was the most experienced computer user in the office. This resulted in two rules: The IT guys introduced a rule that no one was to call them until they’d spoken to me first (actually, they said I was the only one allowed to call them because they were sick of having their time wasted), and I introduced a rule that no one was to ask for help with a problem without rebooting their computer first (unless there was a reason they couldn’t do that).

Do I need to tell you how many times a co-worker would call IT without rebooting OR speaking to me?

The reason they were supposed to speak to me first was that there are lots of little things I can fix without needing to trouble IT, and unlike the helpdesk I was not rushed off my feet (quite the opposite). So if the printer mysteriously vanished from Windows, IT knew I was capable of fixing that without assistance and that’s why they told my co-workers to see if I could help first. One guy in particular - a guy I’m friends with, and who is always telling me how much he admires my computer skills, and who knows how bored and underworked I am - almost never fails to ring IT without asking me if I can help first which usually results in them telling him to go get me and then he shuffles his feet and says he didn’t want to bother me in case I was busy. I don’t get it.

The reason I told them to reboot first is because I’ve discovered that 9 out of 10 problems that we have on the computers in that office disappear when you reboot. The guy who couldn’t get his head around asking my help before calling the helpdesk is also the guy who never attempts a reboot before asking for help. He acts like I’m some sort of magician when I restart his computer and it’s fixed, but no matter how many times I repeat the mantra, “It’s not a problem unless it still happens after you reboot”, it doesn’t sink in. He appears at my door saying “Caz, I’ve got a problem… could you take a look?” and I’ll ask “Have you tried rebooting yet?” and he’ll say “No” and I’ll say “Go and reboot and tell me if that fixes it”, and two minutes later my phone will ring and he’ll say “It’s fixed! Thanks Caz!”… Week after week, month after month, year after year he still doesn’t try the thing that fixes his computer almost every time and I don’t understand WHY?

So yeah, as annoying as it is to be treated like an idiot when you’re a smart person, the sheer volume of idiots out there makes it necessary to assume the worst and ask the obvious questions. “Do you actually have a computer sir? Ok, good. Do you have electricity connected to your dwelling? Ok, good. Is it working? Are you able to switch your lights on and off? Could you just check for me? Ahh, that’s your problem then. Call the power company and see if they can tell you what the problem is. No sir, I’m afraid I can’t really help you until the power company get that sorted out. Tell you what, if you still can’t switch your computer on after your lights come on, then give me another call and we’ll see what we can do. Good day, sir”.

24

[QUOTE=Tracy Lord]
I think it’s an issue of comprehensibility (i.e., can I understand the lady at the other end of the phone?) rather than a national issue, Dutchman.
[/QUOTE]

Yes. I’ve had equal problems with Malaysians and Glaswegians.

25

Well it connected last night. The modem said 1400Kbps but it ran slower than a dialup. It disconnected after two minutes. “Username and password rejected” me arse.

26

Just a thought, jjimm, but are you using an old ADSL modem? A mate had a similar problem and the solution was that the old ADSL modems had a maximum speed of 2 Mbps and didn’t like the new ADSL lines. Replacing the modem resolved the issue immediately.

27

It was the one I got issued with in November last year: BT Voyager 205. Think that might be the problem? If so, how the hell do I convince BT, and who the hell do I call? I really don’t think any of the Bangalore Babes (Juliette, Lucy, Mary etc., or their male counterparts Peter, John, and Simon etc.) will have the initiative or authority to solve this one.

I fucking hate BT.

28

[QUOTE=jjimm]
I really don’t think any of the Bangalore Babes (Juliette, Lucy, Mary etc., or their male counterparts Peter, John, and Simon etc.) will have the initiative or authority to solve this one.

[/QUOTE]

snerk

My apologies. I do sympathise with your problems, but as someone who lives in Bangalore, I’m vastly amused by the term “Bangalore Babe”. :smiley:

29

[QUOTE=Dervorin]
My apologies. I do sympathise with your problems, but as someone who lives in Bangalore, I’m vastly amused by the term “Bangalore Babe”. :smiley:
[/QUOTE]
Why, aren’t there any?

30

[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman]
Indians are getting a lot of bad press lately. Would yo guys prefer tech support from Pakistan or is America the be-all and end-all of internet technology.
[/QUOTE]

In my own post, I mentioned that depending on the time, you could get China.

We actually understood the Chinese. Some of them sounded a bit funny, but hey, so do I! I don’t care where the person helping me is from, but how am I supposed to answer his questions and follow his instructions when I don’t understand them?

Many companies have employment policies assuming that, since English is the official language of India, all Indians have English as their mother tongue. For example, that same company insisted that I had to take 50 hours of English; this led to several Saturday mornings chatting amiably with the Korea-born Brazilian citizen who was supposed to teach Business English to yours truly, a Spaniard who had by then lived in the US for more than 4 years and obtained a degree qualifying her to… teach English as a second language! :smack: On the other hand, nobody thought of evaluating the English level of the Indian imports and some of them were clearly not thinking in English.

A few years back there was a bitsy on Spanish TV about how most of Telefonica’s support techs were Moroccans in Morocco. They used Spanish names so people wouldn’t realize they were talking to a Moroccan. My family’s reaction “that’s silly, why are they making them lie? What do I care where they are or are from, so long as they’re qualified and get decent pay and stuff?”
Another TV station ran an informal street poll a few days later and people always said the same “why are they making them lie? After all, if you get a Hassan it could be one that’s born here - heck, no kid my age would have been a Reuben or a Jennifer and now they’re everywhere!”

31

[QUOTE=jjimm]
Why, aren’t there any?
[/QUOTE]

You get Peter, John and Simon?? I only seem to get Roger. Unless perhaps Roger is always on the line to me when you ring…?!

This doesn’t directly help you jjimm but I moved from BT to Eclipse (www.eclipse.co.uk will take you there). 8MB (which really is 8MB too!) for £18.99 per month - they might even do an offer for new customers. Have been with them for a while - the only problems I had was in setting up because BT didn’t set up the ADSL. Even then the customer service people at Eclipse sorted it for me without me need to contact Bloody Telecoms. They’re based in Exeter too - rather than anywhere else…

32

[QUOTE=Martiju]
You get Peter, John and Simon?? I only seem to get Roger. Unless perhaps Roger is always on the line to me when you ring…?!
[/quote]
I think it’s my sanity being rogered here…

Alas I’m fixed into a BT contract until November. The moment it’s up, I’ll be out of there like excrement off a digging implement.

33

The lovely Asian gentleman (HP support) who helped me two years ago when I was trying to force an (ancient) parallel laser printer to be consistently recognized by a new system (with no parallel port) kept me on hold for 20 minutes while he “researched” my problem. And came back with …

“Here, write this down: w, w, w, dot, a, to, z, cable, dot, com… Google says they have…”

Yeah. Tech support in India googled “parallel usb adapter” and gave me the first result. I desperately wish I could find a job that only required me to google no-brainer answers all day…

(As a note, I told the guy whose computer I was fixing that I could solve his problem in no time: he could either a) let me install a parallel port or b) he could get a newer laser printer. He didn’t want to void the warranty. We got a parallel-to-USB adapter at Best Buy and his computer kept randomly forgetting the printer existed so I had to delete and remap it two or three times a week …)

34

[QUOTE=elmwood]
IMHO, it’s because of two things.

In a previous thread, I shared how I sometimes get email messages asking, in so many words,“You will kindly tell me everything about town planning in NMorth America please” - questions qwith such a broad scope, it would be impossible to answer them in less than a few hundred pages. ALL of those emails come from India. ALL of them. After hashing itout, the verdict seemed to be the Indian educational system; independent thinking and problem solving is far mess important than rote memorization.

Whenever I called a tech support line in the US, the person on the other end often based their questions on a hunch about what was wrong, based on similar problems they might have heard about with previous customers they helped. With the Indian tech support crew, it’s all scripted. Help wizards have never given me any useful answers whenever I had aproblem with my computer, and I don’t expect better results when Sanjit descends through a script. They can’t figure out on their own what’s wrong, unless it falls neatly in the scenarios scripts are intended to solve; loose video cards, DNS server settings, and the like.

Secondly, Americans have a VERY difficult time understanding Indian accents. The sing-songiness and lack of syllable stress is very alien to American ears; it’s unlike the regional North American and BBC English accents we’re accoustomed to. I’ve also encountered a lot of Indian English. “Kindly tell me what the problem is,” for instance, which Americans will interpret as “I assume you’re not a nice person, so don’t be your usual mean self when you tell me what the problem is.” Indian English frequently uses the imperative case in making requests and asking questions, which an American will interpret as a blunt, rudely presented command.
[/QUOTE]
Plus, there’s the nagging sensation that the Indian guy on the phone has my old job. Both of my old jobs. :mad: