Indian Contact centers profitable
By agencies   |   Friday, 14 July 2006, 19:30 IST
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CHENNAI: Contact Center Index Asia has declared customer service as the prime area of opportunity for the country with India having the highest percentage of contact centers with an increased profitability among the six Asian countries this year. A bi-annual study by Aspect Software, the findings show almost half of the contact centers across Asia with an increase in profitability since January while seven per cent reported a decrease. India (64 percent), the Philippines (59 percent) and Malaysia (54 percent) reported the highest percentage with Thailand having a higher percentage of centers with decreased profitability in the last six months. While the survey shows the country’s primary area of opportunity in customer service, most likely to use an application service provider (ASP) for its contact center technology requirements, the flip side has also been put under scrutiny. The country is facing the challenge of below average human resource (HR) performance, particularly in terms of agent turnover. Issues such as absenteeism and staff turnover are major issues for Asian contact centers with the highest level of agent absenteeism is in India at 10 per cent a day and the lowest is in Korea at three per cent. Besides focusing on improving HR management, contact centers in Asia need to continue to invest in technology to compete effectively with players in the global market, the study points out. Some 200 contact center managers from various industries in India, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand were subject of the survey with the five parameters of judging being customer service, human resources, revenue, sales, operations and technology.

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