Have a group interview for a customer service position coming

Ok man this is going to seem harsh.

They conduct group interviews for roles like this because the staff turnover and drop out rate from application through to the first week is very high. It is about the only economical way they can sustain staffing.

The ideal call centre candidate is bright enough to follow a script, but not intelligent enough to get bored and attempt to deviate from it or game their systems. They also don't want you to get ideas above your station such as not wanting to be monitored with automatic ranking software designed to enter you in a competitive rat race amongst your fellow workers alongside penalising you for taking more than a 2 minute 'personal' break (piss break) per day. They'll even try to sell the 'personal' to you as a caring thing oh sometimes you get an angry customer and we KNOW you want to help, but you know, you just can't help everybody *rolleyes* and we recognise that our empathic staff sometimes take it personally so you need to log off? Take a few minutes to gather your thoughts? You can take a personal once a day and we encourage it so you don't get too burnt out. Never mind that you'll be using that to piss and it'll be 2 minutes not a few and if you login 15 seconds late you'll be expected to make it up and your sadistic prick supervisor selected because he enjoys sweating everybody and is stupid enough to trade indifference for hatred and another 2 pennies an hour will direct long winded callers to you 5 seconds before your 15 seconds making it up time ends and you'll be expected to finish the call even if it means you miss your bus home and that'll be to punish you for logging back in 15 seconds late from your so caring 'personal' which you never get to use to prevent burn out anyway.

Equally though even if you are perfectly suited to the role they don't want you to stay forever because there is almost no career or progression and eventually even the most bovine get burnt out and start to cause problems.

>>18557168
>They conduct group interviews for roles like this because the staff turnover and drop out rate from application through to the first week is very high

Why is this?

As far as I know stated in the two roles available one is just helping people through online-chat about tech product queries and helping them choose what they should purchase and the other is helping people with shipping and order queries over the phone.

I could understand people getting burnt out doing outbound cold calling trying to shill some product, but inbound seems a lot more comfortable.

>>18557189
Ok. First off not all places are like this, but I imagine if they remain profitable as businesses all places will eventually be like this.

Most companies no longer have in house call centres. They contract out the work to specialist call centres who can do the work cheaper for multiple companies tendering temporary contracts. They do this by not having the same moral or ethical compulsion to staff that companies which need to have positive reputations to sell to the customer as manufacturers so they can work cheap. As a result they want you to work fast and to a script.

The whole process is monitored. You login in the morning and you'll be expected to be there early enough to login a few seconds before your shift (pay) actually starts. The time you take to answer a call, the time you spend on a call, the time you take to update notes will all be linked and graded against everybody else. The same with break time, any 'down' time, any time you aren't on a call, any less than excellent customer feedback you'll potentially have to justify. They'll be targets just slightly out of reach with minor rewards to make it seem fun, but real punishments for those who consistently fall in the lower bracket.

The system is built so a fair amount are always at risk though. They want job insecurity and they want reasons to dismiss staff to keep turn over high because you only need to be able to follow a script and they don't want you to be there too long because then they have to worry about pay rises and complaints as staff get wise to the unfairness of the system. The fact they are on contract work as a company means if they lose a contract they might suddenly need to downsize significantly so they keep the staff turnover high so they can lose so many staff so quickly without having to pay out redundancy for long service.

Lots of people don't want to work like this so every week is like, 10% new starters.

>>18557220
Well it's a 6 month contract with 'possible' extension so judging from what you said I'm guessing the extension chances are low.

I may as well give it a shot because I need a job, but I really appreciate the insight and I guess it'll test my mental fortitude for the sake of money.

>>18557237
Your experiences may be different dude. I wish you luck with it and I hope it is. If the place is like the ones I've experienced though just be aware of it. The process of making it seem fun and friendly is just to put a happy face on a system designed with social science to performance manage you and automate the process of delivering cost effective customer service.

Personally I've no problem with putting in effort, working hard, 'grafting' etc as long as that it within something with clear progression, a career path and job security even if only by intent. When what is being offered to me has no progression, no career path and insecurity by design I can't exactly be blamed for calling it how I see it which is basically a chance to earn some money.

Also call centres don't tend to require much from you except that you are punctual, can follow instruction, work effectively, accurately and don't turn up drunk or high.