Attention: News editors; business editorsPR 4354
20 April 2000
CALL CENTRE STAFF RUN RINGS AROUND THE SYSTEM
Call centre staff are fighting back against their strictly controlled working environments by finding loopholes in the system to allow them vital breaks.
Staff, whose every move is monitored including the length and frequency of ‘comfort breaks’, are developing ways to manipulate the system.
These are the findings of Open University researcher Dr George Callaghan who has undertaken a long-running analysis of working conditions and control structures in call centres.
Dr Callaghan visited a Telebank call centre in Scotland several times over a nine-month period, interviewing staff and observing recruitment, training and working conditions.
In a joint paper with Professor Paul Thompson (University of Strathclyde) his research Structural Control in Call Centres is being presented at the 2000 Labour Process Conference later this month.
Call centres are among Britain’s main employers and it is estimated that three per cent of the UK workforce now works in a call centre – with the number set to grow.
“Call centres are opening on what seems to be a weekly basis,” said Dr Callaghan.
“The massive increase is down to cost and control over work. For example a recent study showed a call centre can carry out a banking transaction for 80p, compared with the £1 it costs to carry out the same transaction over the counter in a branch.”
“By looking at working conditions in such call centres, or ‘electronic sweatshops’ as they have been dubbed, we see not only the structures which are put in place to control the workers, but also the ways in which the workers are fighting against the strict regimes,” said Dr Callaghan.
Many call centre staff, particularly those working in the financial services sector, have all their conversations recorded for legal reasons, others are monitored by managers while handling calls and all have the number and length of conversations reported on a daily basis. The length and frequency of their ‘comfort breaks’ is also noted, as in the length of any unproductive gaps between calls.
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“Call centre workers have their workload and time strictly controlled,” said Dr Callaghan.
“Many feel their personality and initiative is being taken away from them because they have to stick to a pre-prepared script, and some staff compare the work to being on an assembly line, with calls being fired at them in rapid succession,“ he added.
Call centres suffer a high turnover of staff and the worst rate of sickness and non-attendance due to stress. Dr Callaghan’s research has shown that many staff, especially experienced workers, are developing ways of fooling the system, to give themselves some ‘down time’.
This mainly involves manipulating the system using different codes so it believes they are busy with other tasks such as administration or giving advice, instead of taking calls.
One worker reported:
“I can bang in 661 which means I’m doing a memo, and I might not be doing a memo…..Or you bang into other codes. I do a lot of amendments….Some days I won’t have any to do but I’ll band in 922 and just sit there and chill.”
Staff have also developed their own support mechanisms to relieve the monotony of their strict working regime. These include making hand signals to each other when they have awkward customers on the line, and having a laugh and a moan at the callers and their managers when they are on a break.
“Work in call centres is difficult - as tough, demanding and repetitive as any assembly line work, with the addition of having to sound "happy" all the time. Yet despite such conditions workers, as they have always done, engage and negotiate with the system to find time for themselves, to control their own labour," said Dr Callaghan.
Editor’s Notes
George Callaghan will be presenting his research paper Structural Control in Call Centres at the 2000 Labour Process Conference, University of Strathclyde, April 25-27.
The authors would like to acknowledge the support of the ESRC for the project Socio-technical systems and call centres.
The Open University Business School (OUBS) works in partnership with SITEL Consulting, who offer a Certificate in Call Centre Management. This runs in conjunction with the OUBS Professional Certificate in Management.
Contact details
OU Media RelationsFiona Leslie 01908-653256
OU in ScotlandDr George Callaghan0131-225-2889
OUBSKatrina Cryer01908-655888