Google, you owe me $38.00 an hour…

So, I’ve been dealing with the Indian call centre in Google on behalf of work. Basically it’s all to do with Google SEO – Search Engine optimisation – yes, sounds more impressive as initials. The company had been paying money into it on a regular basis because, well, I don’t know, companies do stuff like that. Google, in its infinite wisdom, allowed India to handle this area of their ops and essentially they suck badly at it. I had to explain to half a dozen very polite Indians, who were clearly reading an approved answer off a script – if you have worked in a call centre you know exactly what I’m talking about – if not – the script is placed beside you to answer any query a customer has that you’re not sure of the politically correct answer to.

Example –

Customer - my bill is too high. How can that be?

Script –I suggest you buy an answering machine.

Customer – What? Why?

Script – Your account number is in the top left hand corner

Customer – Are you listening to me?

Script – To set up call waiting…

Customer – I said my bill is too high.

Script – I am happy to send you a brochure on our disabilities services.

Customer - You’re an idiot.

Script – We do not show an idiot in our catalogue. I will transfer you through to faults.  

  

Anyway, back to the Indian call centre. The main issue was they couldn’t find all the money that had been paid.

-Madam, you don’t understand. We cannot see the payments on screen.

-Madam bloody understands that you’ve had had zip training.

-What is zip training? Is it new?

So, I got the manager of the call centre to log into the work account while I was also logged into it. I then walked him through THEIR billing system, where the payments were and on what date and which bill the payments corresponded to. He responded that he was ‘most interested’ and would discuss with his ‘specialist team.’ It turns out his specialist team isn’t that special and I had to walk them through their billing system while sitting in Australia.

Here’s the thing Google – I work out I have spent at least 15 hours of work time on this at $38.00 an hour and it’s still ongoing as the specialists try to now allocate the money because there’s no script for that.