Indian call center lands in Ohio

[Freddie Stubbs]

Source: CNN/Fortune

By Jia Lynn Yang, Fortune writer-reporter
August 3 2007: 5:49 AM EDT


(Fortune Magazine) -- It would be easy to imagine Reno, Ohio, as the type of place that would be hit hardest by outsourcing - a small American town losing out to the invisible hand shifting jobs to places like Bangalore and Guangzhou. Instead, outsourcing is bringing the jobs to Reno. Across the street from an Army Reserve center and next to a farm, a customer-service call center hums, its 250 workers answering phones for online travel agency Expedia. The center's owner? Indian conglomerate Tata Group.

The phenomenon has a name: "insourcing," the term experts are starting to use when foreign multinationals open offices on U.S. soil and hire Americans, at a higher price, to do the very jobs they once lured overseas. In this case the center in Reno is targeted toward companies willing to pay a premium - its workers there cost up to 40 percent more than their counterparts in India - to give their U.S. customers a more culturally fluent, less frustrating 1-800 experience. (No more hearing someone read from a script ten time zones away.)

Tata, which is based in Mumbai, established its Reno roots last year when its business services unit, SerWizSol, bought the call-center business of travel-processing firm TRX; the deal also gave it a call center in Milton, Fla. "We want to be able to say to a client, If there's a piece you want to keep in America, we can do that for you," says Ricardo Layun, head of U.S. operations for SerWizSol.

Multinational corporations, of course, have been hanging shingles in the U.S. for years. According to the Organization for International Investment, firms headquartered abroad employ 5.1 million Americans in their U.S. offices. But while these jobs have typically been in manufacturing (think German carmakers' factories in the South), the mix is changing, and more companies are finding that hiring Americans offers distinct advantages. Some companies feel hearing a fellow American makes callers feel more comfortable. Other foreign firms think Americans bring a more entrepreneurial attitude to their work. In Expedia's case, its call-center workers need a firm grasp on U.S. geography.



Read more: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/08/06/100141303/index.htm?postversion=2007080305

[DS1]

1. I hate Tata

I like tatas, but Tata can go to hell

[Nomad559]

2. : -)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x298628

:)

[peacetalksforall]

3. I become infuriated when I know someone is following a tight

script and can't imagine deviating to even consider the problem - if it's not in a flow chart - the problem doesn't exist - their bosses must threaten them with U.S. Military/Blackwater type prisons if they think for themselves .

[TygrBright]

4. That bang you just heard was yet another irony meter biting the dust... n/t

[4_TN_TITANS]

5. How ironic....

Then again the Oreck call center moved to my little TN city. Not only do people want to talk to Americans, they want to hear "now what can I do for you sweetie"...

[goodgd_yall]

6. So what is

40 percent more than their counterparts in India?

[OhioChick]

10. Good Question. n/t

[toopers]

11. Having been involved in the call center biz, on the client side . . .

when companies first started moving call centers offshore, the cost was $.25 per minute. I know as it got more competitive, it started to move up. We were paying $.60 per minute in the US at the time.

[mhatrw]

7. Tata is creating US jobs for Americans!

I mean, somebody has to do all that visa paper work! Somebody has lobby Congress to give away all the rest of our jobs. Not to mention the fact that the repo man business is booming.

[Orrin_73]

8. Call center jobs are mostly low paying jobs

the real deal are the software engineering, analysts and other jobs that are important.

[OlderButWiser]

9. But in many areas...

...any jobs are good jobs.

[bitchkitty]

12. BINGO n/t

[Deja Q]

13. I like tatas, but will Tata be staffed with a lot of H1Bs, the way Bill Gates would love it?

I shouldn't be so cynical; a multinational corporation is just that. Multinational. If the playing field is being leveled, this is finally a sign that Americans aren't being left to rot by everyone else.

Wow. To have hope once again.

And once Tata starts selling their new car to Americans, they will be even more revered.