Experiences of a call centre?

[Bimgy85]

Have you ever worked in a call centre?

I wouldn't like it as a career but perfect for a bit of money short term. However I can't understand people there years who see it as their career.

What's your good/bad experiences of call centers?

Mine: the variety of people, hundreds of people from all different walks of life , regular breaks and good structure, lots of friends of the same age and older/younger

Bad: so so so so repetitive, you're a number on a conveyor belt,doesn't matter if you do a good or bad job tbh as you're very replaceable.

My husband has worked his way up in an mobile operator call centre, moving from site to site.
He’s now a sales coach responsible for increasing the sales for the whole site and is on around 35k. He works four longer weekdays and has weekends off and a day off midweek. He gets 30 days holiday and they’ve been really understanding since he developed a long term health condition.

Don’t think he’ll leave anytime soon.

Similar to @BarryTheKestrel , started temping in a call centre, went perm, became s TL and then moved to a department that managed the compliance for our outsourced contact centres and ended up heading the department. What should have been a three month job became a 9 year career.

There were still plenty of people I joined on the phones with; who, when I left were still doing the same job. They were familiar with it, they came in, made their money and went home. They didn't want to manage people or have additional duties. Some months I was signing off commission figures of 4K+ after tax for them so I understand why.

In the right team, you can earn a fortune for seemingly little leg work.

Check your soul and any joy you have in life at the door. You won't need them.

Don't do it.

There's a reason the suicide rate amongst call centre employees is one of the highest. I worked for a rather large department stores technical support department within an outsourcing company and in 3 years 5 co workers commited suicide.

I did it for around 10 months. British gas customer service. I loved it. I worked with a great team, my manager was great and the day flew. However I was an agency worker so I left to go to another job as a permanent member of staff. I'm glad I went when I did because the role changed to a sales one and everyone absolutely hated it.

Not everyone wants a career. I'm a debt collector, it's not really a CallCenter per se but I do work on the phone and I really enjoy it… My salary plus bonus is over £30,000 per year and I live in the north of England so it's very competitive. I have no qualifications but Zits a very challenging hard job. I have been doing it for 10 years, the company is great to work for with great staff perks and they are very ethical. I work Office hours which fits in perfectly with my family and my husband is the breadwinner, earning four times what I do. It works for me, it works for us, it works for my family and I don't think I will ever leave!

Fuck off with your pleb job comments.

I hated it. 14000 a year for a 40 hour week. Car repairs for an insurance company. Some batshit people would call and couldn't understand why their budget insurers we rent going to pay for their small crappy 20 year old car when it would be cheaper and better for them to have a payout. Or when they want a like for like car but what they mean is they want a 4 x 4 to replace their clip. And when you say no they say they will come and burn your house down and rape your kids happened more than it should. Call centres can be good or they can be shit... I did it for 3 years. Never again

I hated it. 9 months in an emergency call centre. EVERYTHING was timed, including how many times you went to the toilet - more than 3 in a shift and you were spoken to by your team lead.

One minute late back from lunch, put on a PIP.

Every call recorded and a sample listened to. One word said wrong from a script - even as strict as using c for cat, instead of Charlie, got you a PIP.

Honestly the worst 9 months of my life.

Not too bad, better than working in fast food. Don't say anything that you don't want the whole call center to know because eventually they will. Take anti bacterial wipes for the mouse and keyboard because of the sneezers and non hand washers.

Same as chuff too. Except no script. But we were audited weekly and our results put on a board in front if the whole centre. Less than 95% you were in red and bonus risked! A bonus of maybe 200 a year...

5 years worth. Inbound customer service so no horrid cold calling or anything like that.

Spent a year on the phones, 3 years as a team manager and a further year as an operations manager (managing 10 teams of 12 advisers) so gave seen it from all angles.

I loved it, but I do think it's a stressful job and can be really affected by the quality of your line manager.

I think customers can be vile as it's so faceless (a memorable call is a customer telling me my parents would probably prefer me dead than working in a call centre- all over a gas bill that was wrong sticks out) and you need to be the type of person that won't take comments to heart to work in that type of environment.

Ah yes @HannahHut the gossip is legendary.

I still work for the same company but in a totally different area and we still get wind of the call centre gossip, it's always juicy.

For single people (and not single sometimes) it seems to be a constant source of people to shag as well 😃

I used to do it when I was younger. It was a hard job, people can be really rude over the phone and shouty. But it filled it's purpose.
And it really does depends on which department you work in.

The pleb comments are really rude though. Someone has to do these jobs. I really respect people who do jobs such as cleaning. Such a thankless task but they keep the world running 💪

I think some of the comments on here are a bit judgemental (especially calling it a pleb job ) - it's the same mentality I received from a few people when I told them what my job was when I worked in them.

I've worked in 2 different call centres. One was an energy supplier - they timed everything you did, pushed you to sell things to people when you knew they couldn't afford it and the only people who became managers were friends of the bosses. I hated it.
Second one was a car insurer and I stayed for 5 years. I liked making a difference to people - how you handle a panicking customer who's had a crash, has kids in the car and doesn't know what to do matters. The hours were good, pay was ok but bonuses were amazing and they were happy to help you move / get promotion / have further training.
The teams were lovely, I made some great friends and it really helped build my confidence. Yes some customers were bloody horrible but that says more about people in general these days than about the job and nice customers outweighed them 20 to 1.

A few years ago, worst job of my life.
I thought it would be a good way to earn money and they were always asking for staff.
The work itself wasn’t bad but that wasn’t the problem. They treated staff very badly, no parking provided, timed toilet breaks, people rushing around as everything was timed, constantly being watched. Big warehouse type building, no aircon, awful.
I’ve never seen so many unhealthy looking people.

It must suit some folk, but I felt my health go downhill after 2 weeks.
Bright side ? I am always lovely to people on the phone and will never give out.

We had the previous day’s results up on the board as well, until someone from the union twigged on that it contravened data protection legislation and impacted on staff’s “dignity at work” so all results had to be emailed privately to each individual, and affected every department across the bank.

It was annoying as a manager but I loved the fact the union had such brass balls to push it!

I’ve worked in one for 14 years (though for the past 12 I’ve worked in a support role rather than taking incoming calls). I work part time hours, have a good salary, lovely colleagues and pretty decent perks.

It’s not all smooth sailing, but the pros outweigh the cons significantly.

I've never personally done it, but one of my ex students left school with only a handful of GCSE's - a lovely boy but just not suited to studying. He started work in a call centre, and 6 years later added me on facebook to say that he was now the Deputy Manager of the whole call centre. So in his early 20's he had responsibility for hundreds of staff.
Call centres have such high labour turnover that if you stick around and impress them, you can progress VERY quickly, like supermarket work or fast food. Its interesting how, on mumsnet, doing silly little craft things on Etsy making pennies and living off a man is OK, but call centre work where you can work your way up and be independent is looked down on and called a "pleb job". I know which I'd rather do.

I've worked in one for 11 years, for a major supermarket. It was only meant to be temporary until I found something else, but I love working there and have made some amazing friends.

The managers are really keen to help you progress if that's what you want to do and I've been lucky enough to have been given some great opportunities.

Also don't appreciate the "pleb" comments from PPs. No child goes through life saying "I want to work in a call centre when I grow up" and a lot of us went to college or university, but ended up not turning that into a career for various reasons. True, you might not need lots of qualifications to get a job in a call centre, but that doesn't mean they're not filled with intelligent people.

“Its interesting how, on mumsnet, doing silly little craft things on Etsy making pennies and living off a man is OK, but call centre work where you can work your way up and be independent is looked down on and called a "pleb job" “

Yep!

I did it for quite a few years before I moved into this job I've now.

BEST YEARS OF MY LIFE.
The pay was a good basic salary but I earnt lots of commission, I got free lunch provided and other great perks.
The people I worked with were lovely and some of the best people I know.

Some centres are bad, but it's rude to look down on people who work there, do you look down on cleaners too? We provide you with a service and without us you would have to use funny computer systems that crash very 2 seconds

:O 26k for 21 hours @QOD ??

I get 17k for 45hrs in my grad job 😭😭

I've worked in a call centre for 20 years now and I absolutely love it.
It's not your typical call centre... someone upthread said theirs was like an office where they take calls. Ours feels more like that.
I'm a team manager and warning £35k
There are a lot of opportunities for back office support, project management, resource management and HR.
The comradeship we have amongst colleagues is amazing. We are supportive of one another and passionate with it.
There is high turnover amongst the younger staff, but many of us have been there 15-25 years.
Productivity is the main focus and you are micro managed. But if you go in and do a good, honest days work, then you simply can't go wrong. Micro managing is prevalent in call centres because a lot of people take the absolute piss.
I've had people go to the bathroom for 30 mins outside of their normal break. When I asked where they were, response was 'taking a shit' with a 'you can do fuck all about this' smirk. Yes that's fine Johnny and I'm glad you got to read your phone for half an hour, but whilst you were doing that, the colleague who sits next to you had to work extra hard to answer the calls you didn't!
I love the atmosphere, love the hours and flexibility. Very easy to work around raising a family. The company are great about making you feel valued and I have the most loyal and hard working team in the company!! Most of them have been with me for 10+ years and they are amazing!
My story is a positive one but for many it isn't... some people have an awful experience but I believe it is what you make it. You need to be hard working and resilient. Some of it is repetitive and boring, but it's a nice, clean, easy way to earn a very good, very secure living with lost of perks!

No one said anything about making things on Etsy or living off a man (always gets dragged out)
In fairness I'd rather do either of those than call centre work

BUT it suits some people and I'm glad there's positive experiences of call centre work.

I did a decade in the ambulance control centre
Stressful, underpaid, rewarding