Over the past few years Bulgaria has certainly made it’s name in the world of contact centre outsourcing. Not only are business in Europe choosing Bulgaria as their nearshore destination of choice, but businesses in the US are now casting their eye over towards the east.

If you did ever find yourself in Bulgaria’s bustling capital city Sofia, you might be greeted by one of its 1.3 million residents with “Zdraveĭte, radvam se da se zapoznaem!” (Hello! I am glad to meet you). However, if you’re like me and rely on a translator, there’s absolutely no need to fear as over 1.7 million people in Bulgaria can speak English. Other European languages spoken in Bulgaria include (but not limited to):

• Bulgarian (obviously)
• Turkish
• Russian
• German

We recently caught up with waterdrop®’s very own Martin Vatchkov to get an on the ground view of Bulgaria. Not only is Martin a Bulgarian national living in Austria, Martin has also previously outsourced his customer service operations within Bulgaria:

“Здравей (Bulgarian “Hello”)! Diving straight in on why Bulgaria, which is mainly driven by the fact that Bulgaria has a highly effective language school system, where most European languages are extensively and effectively thought, the baseline is rather high and difficult to beat.

The university of “St. Kliment Ohridski” in Sofia has added another building block to the already high level of schooling within Bulgaria. This has brought some rather rare languages to Bulgaria such as Japanese, Korean, Arabic or the Nordic languages to name a few.

Once you get past the languages, another strong positive for Bulgaria would be the Geographic location. +2 hours from GMT and +7 hours from EST in the US, with US shifts (16:00 to 01:00) being something normal. Distance in my opinion is another asset at around a 3-hour flight, from most places in the European peninsula which is a rather short flight. Companies have started to explore the whole country with the opening of offices at the seaside (Varna and Burgas) and not only the capital, Sofia.

On another note, the fact that Bulgaria is part of the EU and NATO, brings GDPR with ease (contractual wise, as no data is leaving the EU) as well as economic stability. Internet downtime is almost nonexistent with high speeds.

Last but not least, the BPO and ITO industries are rather filled with the younger part of the generation which bring a lot of ideas and high engagement rates. AI is no foreign word and working efficiently is certainly a big asset as both industries have been embodied quite well in the countries’ economy.”

Thanks Martin! Contact Centre Panel too has had some terrific experiences with contact centre’s in Bulgaria, and we think you will too.

Like what you hear about Bulgaria and want to find out more? Get in touch, we’re here to help.

Our very own Neville Doughty recently caught up with Sean McIver for MaxContact‘s latest episode of Talk Time, discussing how successful outsourcing is built on a foundation of trust, respect, and a shared commitment to sustainability and fairness.

Take a look at the snippet from Nev for a sneak preview.

To listen to the full episode, click on this link.

The full range of Talk Time episodes can be found on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Words cannot even begin to describe what the people of Ukraine have had to endure over the past 18 months, since the war began. However, through this adversity, the outsourcing industry in Ukraine has remained resilient and is still very much open for business – providing a lifeline to those who need it most.

Before the conflict, Ukraine was well on its way to becoming the European hotspot for incredible tech talent and cost-effective solutions for both BPO and ITO services. Has the war changed this? Well, the simple answer is no. Ukraine has had to adapt, there’s no question about that, including looking at how employees in the sector operate and remain safe (which is of the upmost priority). However, the country is still able to rival its Eastern European neighbours in terms of quality of service and cost effectiveness.

When it comes to outsourcing in Ukraine, it’s employees speak English to a very high level – which includes adapting to cultural nuances of other countries with ease. We would say Ukrainian’s have a firm grasp of how Western businesses work. This means Ukrainians are excellent at collaborating with teams from other countries, especially for those business who already have an inhouse team and are looking for an outsourced partner to supplement the numbers they already have internally.

I recently pulled up a chair and had a chat with another of Ukraine’s own, Konstantin Ryzhov, the CEO of Simply Contact. Operating since 2012, Simply Contact has several offices operating in Ukraine, including their Poland office as part of recent expansion. I asked Konstantin a number of questions about outsourcing in Ukraine, with the most pertinent one being, “why outsource to Ukraine?”.

“In Ukraine, we place a strong emphasis on education, especially language skills. This means our contact centers have people who are adept in various languages and also deliver services with high quality. Plus, Ukraine is amazing at adjusting and coming up with new ideas when times get tough. The way Ukrainian companies remain stable and grow during hard circumstances is truly impressive.”

As Konstantin mentioned, the advantages of outsourcing contact center services to Ukraine are quite noteworthy. Let’s take a moment to review these key points:

1. Multilingual agents

Ukraine can offer a broad range of languages, with high proficiency in English and other main European languages. It is an ideal choice for serving a global customer base.

2. Cost-effectiveness without compromising quality

In the realm of outsourcing, balancing cost and quality is crucial. Ukraine excels here, offering competitive pricing without compromising service standards. This balance is particularly attractive to businesses looking to optimise their customer service operations.

3. Time zone advantage

Ukraine’s geographical location and time zone are beneficial for serving European and Asian markets. Also, it offers reasonable alignment with North American business hours. This enables more effective and timely customer service across different regions, 24/7.

4. Diverse talent pool

Ukraine has a large and diverse talent pool. This variety enables you to find the right match for your specific customer service needs, whether it’s technical support, multilingual services, or industry-specific expertise.

Are you considering outsourcing to Ukraine, but want to find out more? Reach out to CCP, we’d be more than happy to help.

Just last week, an associate ruefully observed “There’s no future for UK contact centres. They can’t compete on cost; clients won’t pay”. They were specifically referring to outsourced service providers, but the root cause of their – regretful – sense of despair could apply to all sorts of contact centres:

• The cost impacts of an increasingly competitive job market and mandatory increases in living and minimum wages (incidentally, I’m assuming that no-none could object to notoriously under-valued frontline contact centre staff getting better paid, but increased costs do inevitably create commercial pressures);
• The post-Covid shifts in the employment market, the ongoing impacts of the ‘Great Resignation’ and a general raising in employees’ expectations of their roles;  AND
• An often-toxic combination of increased emotional and cognitive loads for frontline staff:
  • Emotional – as they deal with rising levels of customer frustration and rage, compounded by increased financial vulnerability   
  • Cognitive – more channels, more applications, more complex queries, more rules, more oversight

All of which serves to make a contact centre advisor job even less attractive!

As more and more contact centres roles are transitioned to relatively new offshore locations like South Africa, does this quiet ‘second wave of offshoring’ really signal the end of the mainstream, volume UK outsourced contact centre market?  

What’s happening out there? 

Even without a degree of informed insight, nearly all contact centre industry insiders would agree that South Africa – which for many years has been a ‘left field’ location, more talked about than utilised – has in recent years grown massively in importance and profile.   

It’s over 20 years since the first wave of call centre offshoring to India, when brands first embraced the attractions of delivering customer contact activities from overseas. The long-term results were varied; some preserved successfully, some progressively switched India into a predominantly non-voice delivery location, others recanted and repatriated their contact centres (some quietly, some with a great PR fanfare). Lessons were learned – or forgotten – and the world’s a very different place from the early ‘noughties, but it does seem like we are in the midst of a ‘second wave’ of offshoring.    

From CCP’s perspective many clients are choosing to outsource to South Africa, either offshoring their contact centre services for the first time or selecting the location over another other offshore sites used previously.  

Of course, South Africa is far from the only newly emerging contact centre location. Certainly for the big, global BPOs, South Africa already feels a bit ‘last year’ and Egypt is the favourite location. The spread of outsourcing ambitions and capabilities – whether that’s driven by home grown entrepreneurs or global BPOs looking for the next source of untapped, inexpensive talent – across Africa is a fascinating subject. One we may return to in the near future.  

Countries which feature in the growing list of CCP partners’ operational locations range from Bulgaria to Kosovo in Eastern Europe, and destinations even futher afield like Fiji and Suriname. 

It’s not all about cost. But it often is …

There are many reasons and business drivers which can influence an organisation’s decision to outsource its contact centre and customer engagement efforts. These may range from a lack of technical or operational capacity; challenges with staff recruitment and retention; or an acceptance that the organisation’s points of differentiation and value lie elsewhere and that a third party is best placed to deliver contact and support services. But, of course, the decision might be primarily motivated by price. And for a client making the move from an in-house or outsourced UK contact centre to one located in, say, South Africa then they would expect savings in the region of 50%.

Life’s rarely that simple, though. Outsourcing decisions are often propelled by a variety of factors; there are obvious as well as hidden costs in outsourcing, especially at a great physical distance; and simply ‘lifting and shifting’ a contact centre operation will miss opportunities to enhance their customer experience and the tools and processes that deliver them. However, when most businesses are still adjusting to two years of inflation, raised interest rates and fragile levels of confidence, the prospect of delivering unavoidable services for as little as half the cost is compelling. 

Game over for the UK?    

It might look like it, but there are some good reasons to think otherwise. In fact, in some circumstances – or for some outsourced service providers – we could be on the cusp of a UK contract centre renaissance.  

Here are some reasons why:  

• Cost vs Value: business drivers are often cyclical. The same companies that are massively focused on cost and/or headcount reductions today, may be far more focused on customer value next year. Going offshore isn’t synonymous with lower quality interactions, but they can more difficult to sustain from afar, distant from the domestic culture;
• The ‘stability premium’: Business continuity planning isn’t just about unusual weather events, or pandemic flu preparations (remember them!?) nowadays. War, cyber threats, climate change, civil unrest and both formal and informal economic sanctions are of growing importance. Having a contact centre in the UK rather than thousands of miles away isn’t a guaranteed insulation from these factors, but it helps;  
• Complexity: Analysis, gut feeling and research all demonstrate that simple or ‘transactional’ contacts are increasingly rare. Even consumer queries that are ostensibly ‘easy’ are now frequently evidence of profound underlying challenges – either fixable flaws and barriers in how brands interact with customers, or consumers’ own vulnerabilities. Addressing either requires highly skilled, brand-aligned people; AND  
• Collaboration, collaboration, collaboration: As machine learning and Generative AI become integral parts of how brands’ contact centres manage and interact with customers, the need to collaborate :
  • Tech with ops  
  • Proposition with experience  
  • Clients with service providers  
  • Advisors with AI interaction guidance and knowledge solutions will become more important. Doing so with colleagues and partners located nearby, with genuinely shared experiences, may be at a premium

Conclusion

None of these factors are guarantees that the UK outsourced contact centre industry will survive and prosper. However, one thing outsourced service providers are above anything else is resourceful and flexible, so the best of them will a find a way to differentiate and succeed. 

What do you think? Is the UK outsourced contact centre industry doomed – or, not for the first time, has its demise been predicted way too soon?

Let us know. We’d love to hear your thoughts, whether you’re a client or a service provider, whether you’re based in the UK or abroad.

Like it or not, we’re in an evolutionary stage of the Contact Centre. The exponential growth in communication channels has inevitably created more customer contact, with organisations looking to automation technology as the solution to our CX ills.

Consequently, Contact Centre agents everywhere, are now on a path that sees them handling ever more taxing conversations. We blithely refer to these as the complex calls, having shunted the simplistic stuff off down the self-serve shoot or to cheaper destinations. But oftentimes, what remains as ‘complex’ are really ‘complaints’ by another name.

Thankfully however, in the big-rolling-rock-Indiana-Jones-style avoidance of impending doom, we’ve spotted that all we need to do is hire agents with empathetic ability. Empathy will save the day. Or will it?

Can we look to science for the answer?

There’s a wealth of scientific research to show that empathy is developed very early on; in babies in fact, as this article explains.  The same article however, also points out a cautionary note about those best able to demonstrate empathy:

“Unfortunately, empathy can have some downsides. For example, the second requirement—feeling the same thing that someone else is feeling—can cause some personal distress. In fact, children who are particularly prone to feeling negative emotions are more prone to experiencing empathy (Spinrad and Eisenberg, 2019). In other words, children who are already extra sensitive, might experience intense negative emotions because of high empathetic concern for others.”

Finding the right balance

So, how are we to balance this desire to build upon the empathic ability of our front line employees with our duty of care for them? In an industry struggling to make improvements in all areas, not least staff retention, I believe the answers lie in three main areas:

1. Recruitment – acknowledging that difficult conversations may be a frequent part of the role is an important part of setting expectations and discussing how the agent will be supported in either an office or home-based scenario, is vital. In my experience, those companies that practice great onboarding habits, with buddy systems and 2-way discussions throughout the ‘grad-bay’ experience, stand to gain most by way of employee loyalty and feelings of trust.
2. Leadership – if we’re to hire agents with the ‘soft’ skills and attitude to deliver the best customer experience, it goes without saying that their managerial support system is competent in recognising the signs of burnout, detachment or worse. Equipping those often similarly young first time people managers, the team leaders, with the leadership qualities and techniques to manage stressful situations, is just as important.
3. Analytics software – and finally, whilst tech might be getting a bad rap for creating the complex vs simple call flows, the technology of analytics points the way to understanding what’s happening on every interaction. It’s vital therefore that we apply it to dig deep into the archaeological layer if you will, where the evidence of sentiment will highlight where best to focus support and which areas of the customer experience are creating the most ‘resistance’.

I think Indy would approve.

Beverley Hughes is an independent consultant in the Contact Centre industry with over 30 years’ experience. Working with a variety of clients across commercial, operations and technology, she is known for bringing a pragmatic, ‘hands on’ approach to problem solving and possessing a limitless enthusiasm for the industry.

Ofgem’s research shows that there has been a “decline in overall consumer satisfaction with customer service by domestic energy suppliers since 2018”. And new research undertaken by Thinks Insight and Strategy this summer highlighted that there are practical and emotional barriers to consumers – especially the most vulnerable –  getting the best service from their energy suppliers.  

Ofgem’s Proposal

Ofgem’s proposal covers a wide range of areas, but those of most interest to us are in the consumer customer experience and contact centre space:

1. Requiring energy supplier enquiry lines to stay open longer, including evenings and weekends – and be easier to contact via multiple methods such as email, webchat or other digital-based platforms;
2. Enabling more effective support for customers struggling with bills, including early intervention to identify and offer support such as temporary repayment holidays when consumers are unable to pay;
3. Prioritising customers in vulnerable situations, or their representatives, who may need immediate assistance;
4. Making 24/7 emergency support available for customers who are cut off from their power or gas supply due to issues with their supplier (e.g. meter faults); AND
5. Compelling suppliers to make information available on customer service performance to help inform consumer choice when switching, and further drive improvements in service.

Practically what does this mean?

[wptb id=29018]

An untimely Christmas present?

Ofgem intends to finalise the standards in October and have them in place by December. Of course, that’s about the most inconvenient time for energy firms, but perhaps the ideal time to put Ofgem’s ambitions to the test! 

In any event, December is only 3 months away and whatever measures firms need to put in place – technology enhancements, increased internal resources or the use of outsourced support – will need to be initiated very soon. 

What about the rest of us?

Of course, most of us don’t work in the energy sector, provide technology solutions or outsourced customer management services, so does this all matter?  

Well, it does, because the regulated industries increasingly act as a ‘leading indicator’ for the wider economy. In terms of defining expected levels and standards of service (even if that doesn’t necessarily translate into those expectations being met). The financial services, energy and water sectors often now provide a customer template for others to follow. 

If you’re supporting customers in the energy sector you might benefit from some help and support to meet the challenges presented by Ofgem’s new standards. Get in touch, we’d love to chat with you. 

Harry joins the CCP Team as Partnership Executive. As part of the role, Harry will be support our clients and partners (new and old), ensuring that they are getting the best out of working with Contact Centre Panel.

You can read more about Harry, and the rest of the CCP Team, by clicking here.

If you ever find yourself waking on the streets of beautiful Tirana (Albania’s capital), you may be greeted with the words Përshëndetje! Gëzohem që ju takoj (Hello! Nice to meet you) by one of it’s 520,000 local residents. However, if your Albanian is rusty like mine, then the country offers the ability to tap into other European languages which includes (but not limited to):

• English (especially spoken by the youth of Albania)
• Italian (widely spoken throughout the country)
• German
• French

If you speak to any businesses within the UK/Europe, most will already know about Albania’s proficiency as a nearshore outsourcing destination. But, why is this? To find out we spoke to Albania’s own Gerti Haxhiu, CEO of Simetrix Solutions (a prominent BPO in Albania/Kosovo), on why Albania remains a popular nearshore destination of choice for UK/European businesses:

“Albania continues to be a popular nearshore destination of choice for UK/European businesses due to several key factors. First and foremost, the country offers a strategic geographic location with easy accessibility to major European markets. Moreover, Albania’s competitive cost of labour and favourable business regulations make it an attractive option for companies seeking cost-effective solutions without compromising on quality. The country’s skilled and multilingual workforce further enhances its appeal as a destination for outsourcing services and establishing regional headquarters.”

Like Gerti mentions, there’s some very tangible benefits in outsourcing your customer service operations to Albania.
Speaking with some of our clients who currently outsource to BPO’s within Albania, their top reasons for choosing Albania where:

1. Location
If you board a flight from London Heathrow today, you would be touching down in Tirana within 3 hours (max) – even less if you are based in the likes of France/Germany. This means you can be with your chosen outsourcer the same day if needs be, rather than a 12 hour trip if you chosen partner was based in the likes of South Africa.

2. Competitive Rates
Competitive agent rates makes Albania stand out versus its nearby competitors. Albania has a young and productive workforce (48% of the population are under 30 years old), which means costs can be kept competitive.

3. Access to European Languages
As mentioned earlier, Albania has plentiful access to workers who can speak multiple languages at a very high proficiency level. Couple this with the competitive commercials on offer, you can see why business are opting for Albania.

4. Infrastructure
In the past two decades, Albania has made significant strides in improving its telecommunications infrastructure, expanding internet coverage, and increasing the number of internet users – including a recent project by the Albanian government with the aim to expand its internet coverage in rural areas.

Looking to outsource in Albania? Get in touch, we can help source your next partner.