mommyistravelin

Is it me or is the Hilton HHonors program as well as there reservations appear to be outsourcing to India. When I call I speak to folks who are clueless and cant understand anything they are saying.
If that is the case I think I might need to take my business elsewhere.

Westcoaster

I've also noticed that the reps in India don't seem to have been well trained, even the one supervisor I spoke with. Maybe it's just the luck of the draw.

And I also often have trouble understanding English spoken with that accent, especially over the phone where there are no visual cues to help. I do much better with some other accents, but that one is hard for me.

That said, I don't know that changing hotel chains will help. Seems like offshoring/outsourcing is rampant right now. Unless maybe you can find one that sends its business to Canada, like my company did with one function. And even there, I've found that some of the social reference points are different. Kind of amusing, eh?

Craig6z

It's all in the training, whether its in Canada, India, or Ireland, etc. My company's parent moved the IT help desk function from in-house regionally across the US and Canada 16 months ago, to an outsourced provider (I'm not naming names, but the first two letters of the the outsourcing firm's name is CS*) with personnel clustered in Montreal. These people while good natured and polite, really never had been trained on our company's infrastructure. Consequently service suffered badly.

As of this month, the un-named provider, has had to outsource the Montreal facility, to a third party (due to non-compliance with the service level agreements). Only Fortune 250 companies can screw up this badly .

Back to the topic of Hilton... so far the Diamond Desk still seems to be based in the U.S., and consistent service has been my experience.

docmonkey

Agreed. I've had very good service speaking to Dell's reps in India and very bad service trying to resolve something with SBC Yahoo's India-based reps.

MIKESILV

Very interesting all this.

Why do get the feeling the OP has some sort of grudge against HH??

Nine posts: One ( a bit incredible ) about dogs at a Hampton
This one about outsourcing to India ( there ARE people who actually live in the USA with "strange accents" .. believe or not).

Then there is the 8/23 thread how as a Gold no access was given to Executive floor of the SFO Hilton BUT five days earlier on 8/19 she posted that Lisa at the Diamond desk got her rooms at the Paris Hilton.

Might be a good idea to get the/your stories straight

mike

oklAAhoma

Aha! So we have you to thank for this.

PT22064

The accents that I have the most trouble understanding are southern and midwestern accents. The "y'all's" and the drawls just drive me crazy.

HepperSchepp

What's with the fake names though for the off-shore call centers. Hi this Aaron. No it's not. I wonder if they pick a differnt name each day.....

What about a call center in maine? that would be fun. Mummble.... Mummble Mummble Mummble Mummble....

I love the southern accent so sexy.....

trekkie

Hilton from my understanding has been trying to outsource some of the peripheral services like restaurants and so on...

They are mainly concentraing on the management. Generally, for bookings, i suggets the op use the net where possible, if not try calling the usa hotline or the australian or singapore call centre directly. Their numbers are on the websites.

Im not sure if Hilton has really outsourced their call centre to India but i am aware that Hilton central reservation system is not really interconnected as well as one would expect. In term of hotel rates, they are good with rates found on the website but other special rates can be iffy and they sometimes ask you to call the hotel directly which is what i have done on a few occasions.

not2bgrounded

Ah ha! When I contacted the Diamond Desk yesterday it made me wonder the very same thing. Good ole Flyer Talk! It is so great to be able to find out about other's experiences so immediately. Thank "youall" for posting!

Dudesdad

I have had the occassion to call HH (Diamond Desk) and connected to a person in India, yes really. The call was professional, polite and handled more efficently than calls to most other consumer service agenices (cc companies, banks, local retail) in the US. I personally don't care whom I connect to if they resolve the call in a timely manner, without punching in 45 numbers or holding for 30 minutes for the next available rep. Accents are common in America; Northern, Southern, Eastern, New York/New England, Texas, etc.

I work for a F150 company that has offices worldwide, yes India too. If you take the time and ask them to repeat if you can not understand they will help you better than if you get uppity/American with them. In my world travels, over 85 countries, most people like to communicate with US. Given the opportunity and time they will master our complicated language and even stranger request.

P.S. I grew up in the South and get people poking fun at my accents; y'all take care now.

My 2 cent.......

infinityplusone

I agree that various accents can sometimes be confusing - asking someone to repeat what they are saying has worked for me in the past. I have even had a CSR, not Hilton, apoligize for their accent and thank me for being so patient with them.

As Dudesdad mentioned, having to enter your account # twice and hitting several other menu selections and then being put on hold for long periods of time are more frustrating to me then having to deal with someone who has an accent.

If it is so bad that I can not understand them at all, I will thank them for their time and then ask to speak to a supervisor. At least for me, every time I have asked that question I end up with someone who speaks with less of an accent.

GeorgeK

I called the Diamond Desk last week to simply make a change to an existing reservation to change the promotion code. The agent not only couldn't find my reservation, but when he finally did got very confused because I had two cities in one day. Long story, I finally hung up and then called back and thankfully reached someone here who not only immediately made the change but also reminded my that I was using a certificate for a cat 6 at a cat 3 and if I changed my mind later I could switch back to using points for the stay.

cur

And the New Joisey accent is better?

JudyJFLA

Or even Boossston?
When I once spent 3 days transcribing ticket orders from a phone tape for the Red Sox and had to listen to each many times to understand the address.

When I was a kid it was Sherman and Peabody, not Peebeedy!

JudyJFLA