WingsAroundtheWorld

Why does this mean that no one actually answers the phone??

Working in a call centre is hardly a risky setting, is it?

BA = bl*ody awful!

mikeyfly

We know it's a lame excuse for all companies for all failings.

And I imagine if there was an outbreak, a call centre is one of the more risky settings with people everywhere talking to do their job in reasonably close proximity....

deep_south

Have you ever been in a call centre? Some are like battery hens, in close proximity, hot desking (even shared equipment), limited space in break rooms, etc. Many call centre staff are actually working from home which is usually quite feasible nowadays.

But yes, after all this time it is quite a feeble excuse for many organisations. Sounds better than "we don't want to spend money training and employing more staff so hang on and we might get round to answering your call"

At least we aren't usually paying a premium rate for the call nowadays, as most phone packages have unlimited calls. My Sky package charges after 60 minutes and it cost me £35 to make some changes on a Delta flight that was being handled by KLM in London...

WingsAroundtheWorld

Well if they cant be *rsed to staff their call centres (or even with staff working at home) - the airline could at least offer a functional website that allows you to self-serve.....

To Fly to Serve, what a load of rubbish!!!

Foltan

Well crucially it should be very easy to do from home?! The software for fielding calls from home must be pretty straightforward. Call centres should be one of the business functions that still operates normally during COVID!

nivsy

That's exactly what I was thinking. Everyone has had to adapt and while I don't know for certain I believe that many call centre staff or sales staff from many organisations have the capacity and do WFH. Ofcourse whether the BA IT system would ever be able to accommodate WFH is in itself a completely different story perhaps.

YacozA

There is no reason BA call-centre staff should still be in an office. All the Banks, Teleco's and anyone else operating a call centre have switched to WFH capability.

This excuse was acceptable until October... of 2020. Any required capacity should have been created, or maybe BA was busy laying off the IT dept as well.

Krisz

Most of the UK based agents I talked to was working from home. So BA has procedures and equipment for this they just need to scale it to the appropriate level. I’ve no idea why companies just using excuses rather then own it up the problem and say the real reasons of issue. Public would be more sympathetic towards them.

Silver Fox

United has dozens of agents that work from home even before this. BA et al, have had 18 months to work out a strategy for this.

beachmouse

DL’s call center jobs have a work from home option once you have completed a six month probationary employment period.

US-based call center jobs with a WFH option will commonly require that you have a dedicated space with a closing interior door for work quality (ie no home noise in the background) and customer privacy reasons. Given generally smaller homes in the UK and the low pay associated with call center jobs, it could be a case of not every call center employee having the right living situation for WFH

1Aturnleft

I think you've made the very broad assumption that BA's call centres are all based in the UK. The vast majority of BA's contact staff are based in India and in South Africa. There is a small percentage of the contact team who are based in the UK and who I can assure you have the ability to work from home. Generally that requires a dedicated space and a reliable WiFi connectivity operating with a minimum speed (not paid for by BA). BA made a swathe of redundancies of their call centre staff in the UK a few years ago because it was cheaper to employ people in other countries.

Perhaps you can now begin understand why this might not be an option for some call BA centre staff based in other countries and where the local protocol in terms of social distancing in the work place or during local surges in viral outbreak may cause workplace locations to close all together.

I also don't see BA recruiting for UK based contact staff which is going to continue the effect until there's some sort of worldwide stabilization in all things Covid. At which point there'll be less people calling in and therefore no need to recruit additional staff.

PGberkshire

Most agents are WFH anyway....so I think its more about call volumes / stress than Covid

hydro001

Also extremely short staffed at the moment in several areas, call centre being one of them.... If anyone is interested there is a massive recruitment campaign which is still struggling to recruit to point where staff are now given referral bonuses

If you want calls answered more quickly, please apply on the careers site

13901

A lot of the back-office functions have been moved offshore to India. WFH is a bit harder over there, and that also doesn't help.

I think the bigger issue is that the call centres have been flogged very hard in the past 4-5 years. Even before Covid, they had a big Damocles' sword hanging on their head for a long while, with C(r)apita touted to pick them up. It eventually didn't happen, but it all added up... and I bet their sickness levels are high, like the crew's and ground staff.

The bottom line is that if BA had an advanced website sorted out there'd be a lot less need to call. Especially for BA Holidays, a solution that I won't use anymore unless it's the day before the flight and I need a car.

u01sss3

I can't help but think if the welfare of their staff was important they would have more of them. I can't imagine taking calls was ever much fun but it must be really difficult now with all that's going on - I really feel for the staff.
Most of my calls are BAH related and often staff seem to be working from home. I've had a few laughs with agents when they've asked to put me on hold to get a parcel or I can hear a child in the background.