I'm 47 years old. Never have I had unemployment compensation or food stamps. I was a customer care rep for AT&T prepaid wireless customers that West Corp provided the call center for. Because of the Ivory Tower computer generated statistics that West Corporation Call Center on Commerce Park Circle in Pensacola Fl use to determine if you have a job, I lost my job. Yep, fired is the correct term. I ...have applied for food stamps.
It didn't matter to West Corp or AT&T that the AT&T customer experience with me was for the most part pleasant and most of the time the issue was resolved for the AT&T customer on the first call. What mattered to those in the Ivory Tower geek management, who know nothing of what actually happens on the phones, nor the time it takes to complete every step, including the 3 new steps that were added to the call process during my 6 month stay, but time was not allotted for the new steps. What mattered to those Ivory Tower geek managers was that the call be completed in 8 1/2 minutes. Did it matter to West Corp or AT&T that the vast majority of customers have more than one issue to deal with on the phone? No. All that matters is that the call be complete in 8 1/2 minutes.
Also important to the Ivory Tower geek managers, that have no clue of the real world but would rather think of new rules and steps to add to the burden of the customer care reps, is the repeat call statistics. Does it matter to West Corp and AT&T that more times than not the customer calls back in about a completely different reason than the original call? Nope, the customer care reps are supposed to foretell the future and solve the customer's problem before they even know there is a problem. Yep, customer care reps have to be fortune tellers at West Corp if they expect to keep their job. Did it matter to West Corp and AT&T that often the customer is on the phone they are having a problem with, and troubleshooting could not be completed until the customer called back from another phone? Nope.
Did it matter to West Corp and AT&T that the November score card and the December score card of 2011, out of over 200+ customer care reps, only 25% were able to pass the score card in both months? Nope, did not matter one bit. Those Ivory Tower geek managers could not look at the pass/fail ratio of the score cards and say; Hey there is something seriously wrong with how we grade our customer care reps! No such thing as common sense for the Ivory Tower management, neither at West Corp nor at AT&T. A customer care rep's job lives and dies by those score cards. My job died from the score card, and so has 100's of other customer care reps jobs.
Out of my 30 student class, by time I got fired, there were 3 remaining on the job and 2 looking at getting fired if they dont pass January 2012 score card.
I moved to Pensacola for this job. Now I no longer have the job, I have applied for food stamps, and short of a miracle on landing a new job soon, I will be kicked out of my apartment that I leased when I moved to Pensacola, just for this job.
An Ivory Tower computer statistic fired me. I did not fire myself. If you listen to the West Corp supervisors lying mouths; they say you have to fire yourself. That's a crock of bull malarkey.
SO YEA, I HOPE I'M APPROVED FOR FOOD STAMPS UNTIL I CAN GET ANOTHER JOB.
I cant do anything about getting kicked out of my apartment; I mean if I cant pay the rent, well you cant squeeze blood out of a turnip. But of course when I was hired at West Corp, I thought I had a job and signed the lease with my apartment complex in good faith, thinking I would be able to continue to pay the rent.
P.S. When the news reports or promotes West Corp job fairs and how many people West Corp is hiring, as they often do, well it is because West Corp fire 75% or more of the people hired, all because of the Ivory Tower geek management statistics that the customer care reps have to measure up to.
In my 6 months I saw 5 new AT&T classes come in. At 30 people per class, with no let up in sight, they hire to fire. I know it doesn't make sense, but there is a serious lack of common sense in the upper management at West Corp and AT&T.
So if you want food stamps, West Corp is an awesome place to work, because they will have a computer statistic fire you right about the time you get good at the job.
The news reporters would better serve the public by writing a real expose about West Corp. Undercover Boss needs to get in there and learn what life is really like on those phones.
Every former employee of West Corp, should be compensated, if it was those Ivory Tower computer generated statistics that cost them their job.
It never made sense to me why a company would train someone, then when they got good at their job, fire them. It does now. I have recently learned from a trusted source that at&t pays West Corp. $3000 for every new student they train above everything else. 30 people per class is $90,000. New class every 6 week, that's a lot of money! West Corp sets unreasonable expectations of their employees so they can purposely fire them to get that additional money.
Florida is an "At Will" state. This means an employer can fire you for no reason at all if they want to. No wonder West Corp. is here. Greedy ****** destroy lives and a whole lot of them.