Your Call is Important to Us - Part I

Welcome to The Coal Mines

Some months ago, I heard briefly on the provincial news that the province of New Brunswick was planning on putting a goodly sum of money towards “improving the image of working in call centers”. I kid you not. I heard on CBC radio news – twice. Then the story disappeared, and I have not been able to find any mention of it again. I suspect it was shoved firmly somewhere under the broadloom when the howls of laughter erupted.

The province of New Brunswick has, over the last decade, been promoting itself as a leader in the call center industry and they are all over the province. New Brunswick and Nova Scotia have been pumping vast amounts of dollars into wooing the companies that own these call centers into their respective provinces and they have much to offer: fewer statutory holidays, an educated workforce, lower wages, and labour laws that might fall into the category of a religious experience because they are so holey. Oh, and did I say lower wages?

Now, I don’t have anything against call centers, particularly since I work in one myself. For the most part, though the job is high stress as all jobs in call centers are, I like my job: the pay, while not stellar, is not bad, I have a great benefits package, and of course, there are bonuses. My co-workers are a great bunch of people, and there is great camaraderie all being in the same boat as it were. I have hours that suit me, since I am not a 9 – 5 person by nature. Most importantly, the management is pretty decent and we are treated like people, not just “bums in seats”. The surroundings are pleasant, and the coffee is good. I could do without the up-sell aspect of it, but you can’t have everything.

However, I also don’t kid myself: Call Centers are the coalmines of the 21^st century, and not all of them are created equally. Generally, one stands a chance of better treatment in an “inbound” (support) center, than an outbound one (sales). Also, there is an exponentially better chance of job stability if the center is actually owned by the company for which it provides the services, rather than one that lives from contract to contract from any number of businesses.

I freely admit that as far as call centers go, I am far more fortunate than many of my counterparts in other call centers. For example, a lot of them will offer good benefits packages; however, I suspect that they offer those packages knowing that there will be very few of their employees that will ever benefit from them. They will never benefit from them because the working conditions are so abysmal that no one ever stays long enough to collect them. Or the company won’t be around long enough for anyone to collect. For example, I have heard of one place that you are only paid for the time when you are on the phone/ready to take a call. If per chance you have to take 2 minutes outside of your regular break to run to the bathroom for a pee, it is docked from your pay. Heaven help you if you have that extra cup of coffee in the morning or a very weak bladder.

Can companies get away with this? Yup. In New Brunswick, they can

Now, as I have said, not all call centers are created equally: There are those who do in house sales/support for the company that owns them, like say UPS. While I cannot speak to the working conditions in most of them, one thing is certain, when you leave work one day, you can be pretty well assured that your job will be there the next day, barring, of course, being fired. This is not the case with certain call centers that live from contract to contract. Case in point: one day fine day in August, 375 people were at work, up-selling, cross-selling, working for their wages and bonuses, just an average day toiling in the mines. Then, without a word of warning to anyone, Connect North America folded up its tents and disappeared into the night. The next day, these same people arrived at their place of employ ready as much as they could be for another day, and the building was locked, dark, and silent. The only information was a sign taped to the door saying they had all been laid off, and would be contacted.

When last I did hear, the former employees received the wages that they were due, however no severance.

Can businesses do that? Yup. In New Brunswick, they can. Thanks to a loophole in the labour laws big enough to sail a Tall Ship through, Connect North America could give their employees no notice of any impending layoff and no severance. To add insult to injury, the company did not even have the courtesy to have the separation slips ready for the people who were unceremoniously disconnected from their jobs. As bad as New Brunswick is for labour protection, Nova Scotia, home of the Michelin Law, is even worse.