Tears and cheers in the outsourcing game

For over a decade, Michael Morris worked at the Sears call centre in Regina, Saskatchewan.
Last week, his job was sent to the Philippines.
Morris got three months severance pay and described the move by Sears as an “insult” to Canadians.
He was one of 250 who lost their jobs at the centre, which has been in operation for the last 16 years.
Sears officials when making the announcement last June said the outsourcing was necessary because
the call centre industry was facing constant technological advancements and improvements.
Sears like other companies had either had to invest in the technology or outsource the work to a third-party that already invests in the knowledge.
But the key factor behind the decision was cost and scheduling hours in the Regina call centre, which are solved with the move to the Philippines.
Sears is not the only large corporation looking at foreign shores for its call centers.
Earlier this year, Telus Canada opened its fourth facility in the impoverished Southeast Asian nation, looking to add at least 3,000 workers.
Telus’ newest facility is located in Araneta Centre in Cubao, adding to current sites located at Ortigas Centre in Pasig and Fort Bonifacio in Taguig, Philippine media reported.
The Cubao facility employs 900 workers.
The Vancouver-based firm currently employs 8,000 workers in The Philippines.
Globally, Telus has between 34,000 and 35,000 employees, he said. Its Philippine business is its biggest offshore, he added.
That’s mainly because call centres are part of the new economy of The Philippines, aiming to provide fresh sources of jobs to the upcoming boom of workers. Almost half of the 86.2 million people in The Philippines are younger than 20 years old.
According to some estimates The Philippines will surpass India as home to the world’s largest call centre industry to generate some US $3 billion a year in revenues.
Unlike Sears, Telus said no one in Canada is losing their jobs because of the new call centres overseas.
The Telecommunications Workers Union says Telus earns money in Canada and has a duty to employ people in Canada and is outraged by the outsourcing.
Telus has responded by saying it employs about 29,000 people in Canada and continues to hire in Canada for growth areas of the company.
Brendan B. Read writes on TMCnet that the reasons for moving call centres to the Philippines are all too familiar: cost cutting, reluctance to invest in new technologies, and, unsaid but all-too-real: a challenging economy and the popularity of web self-service.
“The moves are also the latest retrenchments of contact centers in Canada, due to and accelerated by a relatively strong Canadian dollar, pushed by commodity chiefly oil price rises, that has made it less competitive as a location,” he explained.
While Canadian call centre workers face the pain, Filipinos like Annie Ali of Cotabato City are beneficiaries of the outsourcing trend.
She calls customers in the United States from her troubled southern Philippine city to offer them refills for their prescription drugs.
The 23-year-old former nursing student is one of the workers in the first and only call centre in Cotabato City, 960 kilometres south of Manila, which is wracked by violence.
“I have made so many friends already through this job,” she said in an interview with DPA.
“I realized that Americans are just like us Muslims - they also have problems, they also get sick.”
Ali was among the first batch of call centre agents trained by Calcent Link Solutions, a business-process-outsourcing firm set up by local businessman Peter Marquez and communications expert Andy Orobia in hopes of helping residents in Cotabato City.
Ali said her family was not happy with her job but she enjoys her work and hopes to be able to save enough money to resume her studies to be a nurse.
“For Muslims, it’s not acceptable that a woman works at night,” she said. “My parents think that I’m involved in some monkey business, but they don’t understand the business. I’m enjoying myself and I’m earning.”
“I also speak better English now,” she added.
Workers at the call centre earn US$170 per month, considerably less than the US$375 dollars earned by call centre workers in Manila but much better than comparable jobs in Cotabato, where a hotel receptionist makes about US$100 dollars per month.
Calcent’s opening in February was a breath of fresh air for the business community in Cotabato City, which is burdened by the impact of almost four decades of fighting between Muslim separatist rebels and the military in surrounding areas.
A picture of US President Barack Obama and a map of the world were hung on the wall of Calcent’s training centre, which can accommodate as many as 20 people at a time. Western music blared from the speakers to keep the trainees awake during their night-long sessions.
Orobio said the new venture was inspired by a search for “what would make Cotabato City a better place to live in.”
“We wanted to improve the image of Cotabato City,” Marquez added.
While Calcent currently has only one account, a US pharmacy, Orobio said they were in negotiations for three new accounts within the month, including one in Britain.
Marquez said the training offered by Calcent not only improves English proficiency but also equips trainees with discipline, self-esteem and “the corporate attitude” to survive in any business environment.
Orobio said people from all walks of life in Cotabato - both Muslims and Catholics - were now applying for the 10-day programme, the shortest in the Philippines.
Alfredo Quimoyog, a 30-year-old farmer, was one of the latest trainees to graduate from the Calcent training course.
For the first time in his life, Quimoyog, who introduces himself to clients as Brian, has been wearing a tie and long-sleeved shirt everyday for the past month - a huge departure from his usual attire of worn-out shorts and T-shirts on the farm.
“The training was difficult at the start,” he said. “We had to be awake all night, but it’s all worth it. My new job has boosted my self-confidence and communication skills. My friends and siblings want to follow me now.”