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2003

Offshore Outsourcing Drives Investment Frenzy into Indian Contact Centres

The persuasive commercial arguments for outsourcing contact centre operations offshore in countries like India has sparked a heated debate about the efficiency and quality of Indian outsourcers. According to new research carried out by independent consultancy Kinetic, it is only a matter of time before the overall standard of Indian outsourcers is comparable or better than that of their western counterparts. THUS plc, one of the UK's leading providers of contact centre services, sponsored the Kinetic research in order to best advise customers considering offshore outsourcing.

"Whether we like it or not overseas outsourcing is an economic inevitability," said Ken Hills, Director of Business Services, THUS plc. "As a market leader dedicated to its customers THUS has a responsibility to assess overseas outsourcing. This research demonstrates that, for many contact centre requirements, customers can now obtain the same levels of efficiency and quality through Indian outsourcers as they can in the UK."

Hills continued: "Public and private investment in India has led to a massive rise in the number of contact centre providers. At the top of the market these outsourcers offer a service comparable to what is available in the UK. However, lower down the scale we have found companies such as cycling manufacturers diversifying into contact centres, without the necessary infrastructure or expertise to offer a high level of service. While THUS has no immediate plans to move its contact centre operations we are now ideally placed to advise customers on which of their requirements could be met in India."

"There are strong similarities between Indian outsourcers and UK call centre operations," said Graham Hoskins, Managing Partner, Kinetic. "Many have taken the opportunity to learn from mistakes made in the West in order to deliver quality best practice call centre operations. There is the willingness and a desire within India to improve and better rival operations. At the current rate of development, we believe it is only a matter of time before the overall standard is comparable or better than that of their western counterparts."

The new research provides a detailed benchmark review on the quality and performance management of operations in India and gives an objective guide for anyone thinking about setting up or moving an operation there. The report is the most up-to-date and comprehensive of its kind . The key findings of the research are:

• Indian outsourcers were rated almost as highly as UK call centre operations in terms of their call handling abilities, covering empathy, listening skills, voice, accent and clarity.

• Indian outsourcers are almost as effective as UK operations in achieving the desired result, whether it is an inbound or outbound call.

• The highest team leader to agent ratio identified was 1:18, with many of the Indian outsourcers reviewed having ratios far better than many UK operations

• Quality management ratings are equally strong in India. This is due to the availability of quality assurance resources and the role that the team leader plays in managing their team.

• Offshore operations have spent a large amount of time, effort and money developing client-transitioning processes resulting in a set of practices much as one would expect to see in the UK.

• Although training in India and the UK can be said to be good in the main, only 7% of the Indian outsourcers achieved a rating of very good compared to 32% of the UK operations.

• Up to 50% of the time spent in induction training in India is spent on a variety of accent neutralisation programmes, comprehension training and the development of other communication skills.

• Client management ratings for the Indian outsourcers were better than for the UK operations with 71% of them achieving a rating of good - very good compared with 61% in the UK.

• E-learning is more extensively used in India with 77% of the outsourcers stating that they have deployed an e-learning solution compared with 23% of UK call centre operations.

• The Indian outsourcers have invested a significant amount of time and effort into developing their Quality Management Systems and Management Information Systems. In the main, Kinetic found the level of investment to be less in the UK.

Kinetic carried out a benchmark study of fourteen of the top Indian outsourcers and compared them against best practice in UK contact centre operations. The study is based upon information gathered during onsite assessments carried out in February 2003.