Dell Tech Support Hold Message: "For an extra fee you can be guaranteed less than two minutes on hold and will be connected to a North American technician."

I haven't had to call techsupport much at all over all these years and neither did I have to call Dell to hear the message above but a friend told me about this today. I guess this ties in to many other posts related to Indian accent...in the end, I don't believe this is a problem and as such not offensive at all. I mean, if the guy you are speaking to does not understand you and vice-versa, why not put each one out of their misery!

But what I don't like about this is that "for an extra fee" part. WTF?

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If you have a gun, you can rob a bank.
If you have a bank, you can rob everyone.
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Quote:

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Originally posted by blorean
But what I don't like about this is that "for an extra fee" part. WTF?

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"Mah deah, there is much more money to be made in the destruction of civilization than in building it up."

-- Rhett Butler in "Gone with the Wind"

It's funny actually. On a sad note - immense height of consumerism (see 'extra fee').

As for the accent. How can you guarantee that Dell call centre here in Canada doesn't employee Desi's with accent? What about the other accents in Canadian or US based help desks, i.e. Philipinos, Chinese, East Europeans, French (read Quebecors) etc.? The last I heard at one of my previous workplaces that they hated 'Australian' accent. lol...

I mean... c'mon, in this age of globalization and immigration, consumers/customers should rid of this ridiculous ACCENT excuses now (high time). Be open to one and all if you want the businesses to survive and have a happy shopping experience.

Ciao...

I used to work for Dell back in 2001 (in the first batch of the first contact center that opened in Bangalore) and my experience talking to the Americanos differ than what they (whoever) think that they don't understand Asian english.

I bet, if someone is really calling for some 'TECHNICAL' help (and not just find a passtime), they would want to talk to someone techie instead of a GOOD SPEAKER (who they should know, don't really help but give a gooooli with their accent and some off the beat talks (hi, haaw aar youuu and howz d weader today

Accent matters to communicate, but as far as the other person understands the simple english you speak and gets help, they shouldn't complain.

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Like you - a Canadian .. but still DESI

Things may be slowly changing now, but in the early days of tech support (say between 1995 to 2002 or so), the tech support people had to deal with some very incompetent and clueless users.
The people claiming superior skin color and superior english skills (sic) were often so incompetent with computers that the frustration was on the other end of the phone (i.e. on the tech support side).