Tried to cancel an ATT service today. Maybe I did and maybe I didn't. I made sure to block any attempt by them to charge my credit card again. Bounced around seemingly from Dallas to India and then the Philippines. They must reward these people based on how fast and loudly they talk and how rude and stupid they can be. I truly cannot believe that they don't lose money by outsourcing CS? I suppose one cannot expect much from a company that promoted a former hairdresser to an executive VP and has 85 to 90% of its workforce as contractors.

quote:

Originally posted by markstempski:
I suppose one cannot expect much from a company that ... has 85 to 90% of its workforce as contractors.

It kind of depends on who the contractors are.

I am an ex Bell Labs / AT&T employee. I did some contract work for AT&T and BellSouth for a number of years.

Some of the most productive people on our projects were contractors -- ex-employees who had retired and then came back into the workforce as contractors. They really know what they were doing.

On the other hand, there were some H1-B contractors that were recruited from offshore; it seemed as if the prime motivation for using them was to fill chairs at minimum cost. The recruiters must have promised to get them green cards and teach them to speak English.

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:

quote:

Originally posted by markstempski:
I suppose one cannot expect much from a company that ... has 85 to 90% of its workforce as contractors.

It kind of depends on who the contractors are.

I am an ex Bell Labs / AT&T employee. I did some contract work for AT&T and BellSouth for a number of years.

Some of the most productive people on our projects were contractors -- ex-employees who had retired and then came back into the workforce as contractors. They really know what they were doing.

On the other hand, there were some H1-B contractors that were recruited from offshore; it seemed as if the prime motivation for using them was to fill chairs at minimum cost. The recruiters must have promised to get them green cards and teach them to speak English.

I too did a multi year stint as an ATT contractor and ran into exactly the same thing. Some years now post that awful experience I thought that it could not have gotten any worse. Based on my latest interaction I would say that it has. I bet their web satisfaction scores are in the mid 50s or below. I should have bailed when Yahoo was having all the security problems, my own fault. The H1 Bs seem to have added attitude issues and not taking turns conversationally. That is how they interact with each other so that is how they act on the phone. I suspect that the other carriers are just as bad.

Ex-SWBell employee here. What V-Tail said. If you get lucky enough to stumble across one of the ex-employees who were worth anything it can be good. The H1-Bs and the tech wonders they hired away from the Geek Squad are another story all together. The last one who shot trouble on my line turned out to be one of my ex-cable splicers helpers. He did an outstanding job.

I was in the software development side. We would receive written specifications and requirements, then write the software to comply with these.

Many of the H1-B "imports" really lacked in English to the point where they just did not understand the specs and requirements, and they did some pretty creative interpretation, turning out a product that did not do the intended job. It turned out to be a real disaster on the part of the prime contractor that sought to increase their profits by bringing in these H1-B clowns.

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Originally posted by jbcummings:
Ex-SWBell employee here. What V-Tail said. If you get lucky enough to stumble across one of the ex-employees who were worth anything it can be good. The H1-Bs and the tech wonders they hired away from the Geek Squad are another story all together. The last one who shot trouble on my line turned out to be one of my ex-cable splicers helpers. He did an outstanding job.

When I became a Southern Bell cable splicer in 1973, the cable helpers were long gone. Dean

As a telecommuter, I had a toll-free number that termed to a business line here in my home with a BRNA feature that delivered any BRNA calls to a voicemail server number. I needed that voicemail term number changed to a different number a few years after the BellSouth/AT&T "merger." When I called my BellSouth customer service number to have the change made I was informed that my call forwarding service was no longer being offered as part of the package that I had been on lo these many years and, coincidentally, they "were about to write me a letter" informing me of the required package upgrade and the associated higher costs.

I informed them that I wasn't asking for a different or upgraded offering, simply a change to the BRNA forwarding number. I stated that I had been on this service with BellSouth for many, many years and these simple adjustments had never been a problem. They then informed me - in no uncertain terms - that I wasn't dealing with BellSouth any more; I was now dealing with the new AT&T. Three days later and one call to COMCAST I wasn't, haven't since, and don't intend to in the future. All is forgiven, BellSouth, please come back.

Regarding the thread title, it wouldn't surprise me at all.

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:

quote:

Originally posted by markstempski:
I suppose one cannot expect much from a company that ... has 85 to 90% of its workforce as contractors.

It kind of depends on who the contractors are.

I am an ex Bell Labs / AT&T employee. I did some contract work for AT&T and BellSouth for a number of years.

Some of the most productive people on our projects were contractors -- ex-employees who had retired and then came back into the workforce as contractors. They really know what they were doing.

On the other hand, there were some H1-B contractors that were recruited from offshore; it seemed as if the prime motivation for using them was to fill chairs at minimum cost. The recruiters must have promised to get them green cards and teach them to speak English.

You have inbound E-mail.

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:
I was in the software development side. We would receive written specifications and requirements, then write the software to comply with these.

Many of the H1-B "imports" really lacked in English to the point where they just did not understand the specs and requirements, and they did some pretty creative interpretation, turning out a product that did not do the intended job. It turned out to be a real disaster on the part of the prime contractor that sought to increase their profits by bringing in these H1-B clowns.

All those people now work for Oracle.

ATT does not want the landline biz. And, by the time management is done massaging the numbers, that 50 percent rating looks like 99 percent approval. This they still get their bonus

Apparently this guy is not a fan either.

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Originally posted by Skins2881:
Apparently this guy is not a fan either.

Yeah, that dude definitely hates ATT.